


The Upload

by gubernaculum



Series: The Namesakes [13]
Category: Highlander: The Series, Torchwood
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-22
Updated: 2015-02-11
Packaged: 2018-02-18 08:36:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 17
Words: 40,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2341973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gubernaculum/pseuds/gubernaculum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Death by Torchwood is never normal, and sometimes not even permanent.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing. I'm only borrowing everything purely for non-profit and completely recreational purposes. The characters of Miranda Ryan, Joseph Fischer, and Henry Fitzroyd are my own. I have cast them as Zhang Ziyi, Jesse Spencer, and Alex Pettyfer respectively. This fic is unbeta'd and therefore probably full of grammatical and typographical errors. Writing is purely a hobby for me. I am an American and have attempted to do my own Britpicking so I apologize for any errors there as well. I am just borrowing Highlander concepts and names so it won't line up well with that show's canon. This is also AU for Torchwood as I like to pretend CoE and Miracle Day never happened.

The first sensation Toshiko Sato was aware of was floating. It was like being in a warm bath but not. She couldn’t feel anything and she wasn’t entirely sure what was happening but she felt peaceful. Then, suddenly, the sensation changed. It was almost like that feeling you got before you fell asleep, like you were falling away from yourself. The feeling when she jolted awake was similar too, like she was trying stop herself from falling. 

Something was very, very wrong.

She tried to sit up but she couldn’t. She tried to open her eyes but there was only darkness. 

“Tosh?” 

“Ianto?” Again, she tried to move, roll or turn but she couldn’t. She tried to raise her hands up to her eyes to see why she couldn’t see and that was when she realised she couldn’t feel her body at all. Panic started to set in. “Ianto?! I… I… I can’t… I can’t move!” 

“Tosh, it’s okay.” 

She tried to kick and flail her legs but felt nothing. 

“Oh God, Ianto… I can’t see… I can’t see! I… I can’t move! OH MY GOD!” She started to scream. 

“Tosh! Tosh, calm down! You’re fine!” 

_“OH MY GOD! I CAN’T SEE! I CAN’T MOVE!”_ she screamed over and over again. She started to sob and couldn’t even feel the tears running down her face.  

“TOSHIKO!” Ianto barked. “You’re going to be okay!” 

_OKAY?! HOW IS THIS OKAY!?_ she wanted to scream but she kept crying. She couldn’t think of anything worse! She was trapped - a prisoner in her own body. She sobbed and sobbed. She didn’t want to stop. She couldn’t even feel the wailing in her throat. The satisfying hoarseness that came from a good solid cry wasn’t even hers. 

It took a little while but eventually she calmed down. She needed to find out what had happened. How did she end up like this? Some accident? Something Torchwood? In a broken voice, she asked, “What… happened… how…?” 

“What’s the last thing you remember?” he asked. 

She reached back into her memory past the floating feeling. It was hard, like she was trying to remember a dream she’d forgotten. She remembered looking into something glass. “I was tinkering with some piece of tech.”

“What was the last case we worked?” 

“Jonah Bevin,” she said, sadly. 

“What was the piece of tech you were working on? What did it do?” 

“It was a neural scanner,” she replied. “I was trying to figure out how to work the readout, scanning myself with it over and over again.” 

“You’re right, Tosh. It was a neural scanner. It was used for memory and personality imprinting,” Ianto said, slowly. 

“What? How do you know that?” 

“Because right now… you’re the imprint we uploaded into the mainframe.” 

_“WHAT?”_

“Tosh, calm down. I want you to concentrate for me, okay? I need you to think about the CCTV system, about what you used to do to access the security cameras inside the Hub.”

It was absurd. It was insane. It was so ridiculous. This must be some mad sort of joke. Surely this was all a dream and she’d wake up momentarily from this horrible nightmare. 

“Tosh… please…” 

Reluctantly, she obeyed. She thought about what she would do to access the CCTV system and magically, light flooded her. A thousand images bombarded her of every single corner of the Hub. She could see the empty staterooms. She could see every corner of the archives. She could see each entrance and exit. She could see the Plass. She could see the Tourist Office. She let out a shrill scream and the desire to shut her eyes against the onslaught plunged her into darkness again. 

“Tosh, slowly, access just the one camera in Jack’s office,” Ianto said. His voice was steady and calm. 

It was easier this time now that she knew what to do. She thought about the camera in Jack’s office and she could see it. She moved it left and right and she had no real idea how. Ianto was standing in the middle of the room, impeccable in his suit as always. He cleared his throat into the end of his fist. “Better?” 

“Oh, God, it’s true…” she said, her voice trembling. She didn’t know what was worse - being a prisoner in her own body or being a prisoner to the Torchwood mainframe. The enormity of what was happening to her wasn’t something she could completely grasp yet. She could feel tears threatening to spill out again but from where? She hadn’t any fists with which to beat the ground. She had no eyes to weep, nor the lungs to scream.  

“Why? Why have you done this to me?” 

Ianto’s answer was simple and desperate all at once. “Because we need you.”


	2. Chapter 2

_Five days ago…_

 

Ianto had just finished his usual rounds to the antique and pawn shops of Cardiff. Torchwood wasn’t infallible. It was nearly impossible for them to catch every object that fell through the rift. Most shop owners knew that if they rang Ianto Jones, they could sell strange or unusual items at pretty much whatever price they asked for. Once, Ianto had purchased a small watch that had had sixteen hours and five hands. Last year, there’d been a small pillow that Ianto assumed was therapeutic. It had a sort of massage and heating setting. It would’ve been quite lovely had the heat setting not been hot enough to sear a quality steak. 

Even though shop owners freely volunteered unusual items, Ianto still went by the shops as often as he could. The shop owners didn’t catch everything and Ianto seemed to have a talent for spotting the strange and unusual. It was a chore that Jack loathed and no one else on the team had quite gotten the knack of it but Ianto was happy to do it. There were only a few shops and most of the time, all Ianto did was walk in, browse and leave. 

He heaved the two small containment boxes out of his boot and walked down the long hallway that led from the garage to the main Hub. The SUV wasn’t there. He’d heard across the comm unit that Mickey and Martha had gone to investigate a small rift alert. Ianto was happy to have them on the team again but their presence highlighted the recent series of disheartening events that had started with the death of Cameron MacDonald. 

After Captain John Hart had vanished into thin air, they’d loaded Cameron MacDonald into a morgue drawer. Ianto had rang Martha and Mickey, and then Miranda had gone on a holiday… leaving behind her mobile. She’d been gone for barely a week when more tragedy had struck the team. 

Gwen had been doing nothing more than walking across the Hub when she’d let out a shriek of pain and collapsed. The blood pooling around her had terrified everyone. Martha had been out looking into a rift alert with Mickey. So, the stunned men had scooped up a sobbing Gwen and rushed her to hospital. To Gwen and Rhys’s devastation, their baby was gone. The pregnancy had been ectopic and her fallopian tube had ruptured. This was their third failed pregnancy and Gwen hadn’t even argued when Jack had insisted she take some time. 

Ianto had wanted to ring Miranda, if not to ask her to return then to at least let her know of the devastating news but no one knew where she was or how to reach her. A few days after Gwen’s miscarriage, Ianto had scraped the bottom of the barrel. He turned to his own Watcher, Shawn Graham, but the young man had been unwilling to deliver any message, citing the perception of interference. 

Frustrated, Ianto had begun exploring other options for team medic since Martha’s time with them was limited. At first, Martha had been teaching Ianto all she could and while she was an excellent and patient teacher, he needed more training. When Cameron had been electrocuted, Ianto had felt helpless. He didn’t want to feel that way again should another mortal member of the team become injured. 

Medical school was out of the question. It would mean years away and even though Ianto had the time, he wouldn’t leave the team for so long… _like she did_ … Instead, Ianto turned to the fastest avenue he could find - the British Army. He’d tried his hardest to expedite things but there had been no way around the phase one training.  

Ianto didn’t see the point. He wanted to be a medic, not a soldier but he found the training to be quite the eye opener. Once he’d passed out of initial training, he realised how important it had been. If he hadn’t done it, he would’ve looked like the gigantic end of a massive bell when he’d gone on to Lichfield for his combat medic course. He would’ve been surrounded by trained soldiers and he would’ve had none. It had been a good decision and there was something about the regimented life of a soldier that appealed to Ianto’s ordered nature. 

With the containment boxes in hand, he stepped into the main Hub and he realised how glad he was to be home even if it was only for a few weeks of leave. He probably should spend the time relaxing or, at the very least, spending it in bed with Jack. He’d lazed about for the first few days but there was no way he could sit down in the bunker while the rest of the team dashed about, working themselves to the bone. There’d be plenty of relaxing later on anyway. Fish and Henry were getting married next week and Ianto had planned a spectacular double stag do. Jack was quite put out that Ianto hadn’t let him help at all. 

Even though he knew Gwen wasn’t here, Ianto still craned his neck looking for her. He let out a small sigh of sadness as he remembered she wasn’t here. He stretched his head up further looking for his husband and their technician. The former was bent over his desk, reading the report in his hands. The latter was also bent over work, tinkering with some piece of tech or another. Ianto put the containment boxes onto the worktable next to Fish’s current project. 

“Anything interesting, Ianto?” he asked, not looking up. Fish had his magnifying glasses over his eyes. Ianto saw Fish’s much loathed reading glasses tossed to the side. 

Ianto tapped the smaller containment box. “This is a pretty one.” 

He opened the box and tilted it towards Fish. Fish looked over the magnifying glasses into the box and set aside his project as a broad smile broke out over his face. 

“Wow,” Fish said. Wearing protective gloves, he turned the ornate bottle in his hands. With a disappointed sigh, he reached for the reading glasses and put them on, examining the phial closely. Martha had noticed the Australian had been having trouble, holding items at arm’s length. Much to Fish’s chagrin, she’d insisted upon the reading glasses. “It’s beautiful.” 

“The scanner says the design is consistent with Baccarati,” Ianto said. 

“Baccarat makes crystal in the future too?” Fish joked. 

Ianto shook his head. “It’s a planet known for their crystal production. It’s called Baccarati because it was colonised by the French. Jack mentioned it to me once but didn’t tell me when.” 

Fish rolled his eyes and joked. He blushed a bit and said, “Probably had a crystal dildo from them he wanted you to try, eh?” 

When Ianto flushed, Fish coughed awkwardly and felt his own cheeks burning. “Oh that was a joke, mate…”

“Jack can be very persuasive.” 

“Ianto? Too much information,” Fish said with a laugh. He tilted the phial. “It’s beautiful. Pity it’ll go downstairs in the archives. My sister would love this thing. She likes crystal, cut glass, anything that sparkles in the light really.” He tilted it in another direction. “Hmm, there’s a liquid inside. Strange… there’s no opening… no top… nothing…”

Ianto put the other containment box on Fish’s desk and walked over. He leaned over his friend’s shoulder. “No way to get the liquid out then?” 

“Not without breaking it. Shame…” Fish said. He put the phial down and took his gloves off. “The planet it’s from must have similar atmospheric conditions to ours. Anything too dramatically different and that crystal’d shatter. Same viscosity as water… similar surface tension…” 

“Could be anything though,” Ianto said. With the protective glove on, he brought the phial close to his face, squinting at the liquid. “There’s not much of it. An ampule for medicine?” 

“Why put it in such an ornate and probably expensive container?” Fish wondered.

“Some species create beauty for its own sake,” Ianto said, shrugging. “Remember that hatchet that fell through the rift last year? The one with the scroll work on the handle and the etching on the blade?” 

“The one Jack said was made by a race that made us look like we were still worshiping fire and drawing on cave walls?” Fish said with a nod. He picked up his penlight and shined it into the crystal. The light fragmented, small rainbows and dazzling sparkles dancing as the phial turned in Ianto’s hands. “I don’t think it’s worth the risk trying to open it and find out what’s inside. Let’s file it away in the ‘maybe someday’ category.” 

“What’s so interesting, you two?” Jack asked as he walked across the room. 

Ianto held the phial up for him to see. “Pretty little thing, isn’t it?” 

“Ooo, Baccarati!” he exclaimed. He took it from Ianto and tilted it in the light. “It’s a perfume.” 

“Perfume?!” Ianto and Fish blurted, simultaneously. 

“How the bloody hell do you open it?” Ianto asked. 

“You don’t. It’s drawn out microscopic holes by capillary action and heat transfer,” Jack said. He walked over to the printer and had it spit out a blank page. He carefully folded the still warm piece of paper into quarters. He ran the narrow end of the phial over the paper while simultaneously tapping the wide bottom. He lifted the paper to his nose and sniffed. He face pinched itself into a scowl.

“Ugh!” he shouted, jerking it away.  

Ianto leaned forward, sniffing the paper himself. He straightened up immediately, with the same scrunched look on his face. He leaned down and sniffed the gloves and his own hands. “Least I didn’t get any on me.” 

Jack held his hand out for Fish and the Australian shook his head. “No thanks,” he said with a laugh. He took his reading glasses off and dropped them onto the table. “I’ll take you guys’ word for it.” 

“This’s expensive stuff,” Jack said, shaking the phial a bit. 

At that moment, the scent had drifted towards Fish and he got a small whiff. “Oh that is rank! Smells like old cat piss and rotting wood! That’s expensive?” 

“To us it does. Might smell pretty sexy to an alien species. Baccarati crystal is the finest in the galaxy,” Jack set the phial down. “It’s not dangerous. Smells disgusting though.” 

Ianto smiled and said, “I’ll leave these things here for you, Fish. I have some filing to do downstairs. Use the comms if you need me.” 

“Thanks, Ianto,” he said, brightly. He turned to the unopened containment box. He pulled it towards him and opened it, studying the item within. He turned to Ianto and said, “You know, you’re the only person I know who decides to work on his holiday.” 

“The archive won’t sort itself,” Ianto replied with a shrug, “and I’d take filing over drill any day.” 

Fish laughed and clapped his best man on the shoulder. “Tuxedo fitting’s tomorrow, yeah?” 

Ianto smiled. Henry and Fish had scheduled the wedding so that it lined up with his leave time. He was embarrassed they’d gone to so much trouble but he was equally touched his presence was so important to them. They hadn’t bothered waiting to see if Miranda would return. “Wouldn’t miss it for anything. Henry going to be there?”

Fish nodded and laughed. “We figured since he wasn’t wearing a dress it was safe. His tuxedo’s the same as mine.” 

“Getting nervous?” 

“Nah,” Fish said. His smile faltered, become less genuine. “As long as I make it through the stag night without Henry leaving me, I’ll be fine.” 

Ianto heard the uncomfortable air of truth behind the joke. Fish’s first fiancé, Olivia Porter, had called off their wedding last minute, gatecrashing his stag night. He gave Fish a reassuring smile and winked. “Henry would never do any such thing… and I’ll have his head, if he does.” 

Fish laughed and started to turn back to his work. 

“You want me to file this in your queue?” Ianto asked, waving at the other box. 

“You can leave it there,” Fish said, shrugging.

Ianto nodded and turned towards the east stairs and the archive. Jack was standing behind Fish, following Ianto with his eyes as he walked away. The young immortal’s sword training had driven away his baby fat but the military training had changed Ianto’s posture and stance. He tilted his head, admiring the way the well tailored suit hugged the fit body beneath it. 

“He looks _so_ good in that suit,” Jack said to Fish, loud enough that Ianto could hear him. Fish could hear Jack’s mouth watering. The two men had certainly been making up for lost time since Ianto had come home… and they hadn’t been subtle about it. 

“Harassment!” Ianto teased without turning around. He grinned at the old inside joke. He walked down the east stairs and towards his office to begin his filing. He began loading a few boxes of files to put downstairs onto his trolley. He pushed it out into the hallway and towards the main archive lift. Suddenly, someone grabbed him from behind, pushing him into the wall. 

“Oi! Jack!” he shouted in surprise. 

“You look _so_ good in that suit,” Jack said. His eyes were dark and he licked his lips as he sank to his knees.


	3. Chapter 3

Ianto was dimly aware of the fact that he was gripping a brick wall. He could barely feel his legs as he tried to catch his breath. In fact, he was shocked they were still holding him up. His fingers hurt a bit from digging into the rough brick but he didn’t care. Jack stood up, zipping Ianto’s flies as he did. He used the tip of his nose to trace the outline of Ianto’s parted lips. 

“Christ,” Ianto breathed. He could smell himself on Jack’s mouth. 

Jack gave him a self satisfied smile, breathing in Ianto’s exhaled breath. He made a great show of sloppily and inadequately reassembling Ianto’s normally pristine appearance. In a deep, husky voice, he whispered, “My office, five minutes.” 

Ianto swallowed, hard. Jack gave him an evil chuckle and then bounced up the east stairs with a lusty spring in his step. Ianto ran his hand through his hair, trying to fix his appearance while simultaneously catching his breath. He straightened his trousers, tucking in his shirt. He took a deep breath and walked up the east stairs. Jack’s proposition had him walking faster than he normally would’ve. He also wasn’t paying as much attention, hoping the rushed and distracted look would mean Fish wouldn’t ask him for coffee. When he walked past Fish’s worktable, he didn’t notice the Australian was crouched underneath it. He tripped over Fish’s leg and crashed to the floor, very ungracefully. 

“Bugger!” he swore. He felt stinging pain. He lifted his hand. There were fresh scrapes on his palms. He flexed his fingers, trying to ease the itch as the skin healed. He scrambled to his feet apologising, “Sorry, Fish. I didn’t see you, mate. Fish? You all right?” 

He stood up and, as he brushed off his suit. Fish wasn’t answering him. 

“Fish?” he asked, bending down to examine the technician. “Fish? You all right?” 

Fish was positively _not_ all right. He was frozen in place! He wasn’t moving a muscle. He was kneeling underneath his table, frozen in the act of picking up his fallen tools. It was like someone had hit the pause button. One hand was over the table’s edge, putting back the screwdriver… a screwdriver suspended in midair over the table. Ianto instinctually took a few steps back away from the unnatural sight. 

“JACK!” he shouted. “JACK!!”

“Oh c’mon, Ianto! Five minutes is plenty…” Jack trailed off as he saw Fish. “Oh, Gods…” 

“Do we need to lockdown?” Ianto asked.  

Jack was ignoring him, tapping at his wrist strap. “Time lock… He’s stuck in a time lock…” 

“What caused it? What do we do? How do we stop it?” Ianto gasped, standing up. 

“I have no idea.” 

“You can’t stop it with that?” Ianto asked, waving at his wrist strap. 

“It doesn’t work like that, Ianto,” Jack said. He leaned over Fish’s worktable at the device in the middle. It was the shoebox sized lego piece. He’d purchased it at a shop earlier in the day. It looked to be made of dark grey plastic.  

Jack pointed at it. “This must be what’s doing it. Looks like he was working on it. He must’ve dropped his tools.” 

“How do we turn it off?” Ianto asked, peering at the device. 

“No idea. I’ve never seen anything like this,” Jack said. He reached into his pocket and took out his comm unit. “Mickey? Martha? If you’re wrapping things up where you are, can you two double time it back?… Yeah, something’s happened… I’ll brief you when you get here.” He turned back to Fish, watching him closely. “They’re on their way.” 

“Fish? Can you hear me?” Ianto asked, reaching for his friend’s shoulder. 

“I wouldn’t touch him, Yan.” 

“What? Why?” 

“It’s not a time lock. He’s not displaced.” Jack tapped his wrist strap again. “It’s time dilation. He’s not standing still. He’s experiencing time slower than we are.” 

Ianto stared at the screwdriver. It might be Ianto’s imagination but it looked closer to the table than it’d been when he’d found Fish. “The screwdriver…” 

Jack nodded, still watching his wrist strap’s display. “I haven’t figured out the ratio yet.” 

“It can’t be too wide since we can tell that’s falling,” Ianto said, nodding at the tool.

“It’s wide enough,” Jack said, waving at Fish. 

“Do you think he can hear us?” 

“I don’t think so. I don’t think he can see us either,” Jack said and then tilted his head. “Actually, he probably doesn’t even realise something’s wrong yet.” 

Ianto turned to the device, putting on the protective gloves. “There’s no panel, no buttons, nothing…” 

“Mickey will look at it when he gets here.” Jack squinted at the vortex manipulator display and then flicked it with his finger. 

“Flicking is in the vortex manipulator user manual, is it?” Ianto scolded, taking off the protective gloves.

“It’s not giving me the ratio,” Jack said, flicking the display again. He put the wrist strap up to his ear. “I hope the Doctor didn’t break anything else.” 

Mickey and Martha might be on their way back but Ianto couldn’t just stand there and wait. He walked over to Fish’s workstation and brought up the CCTV cameras for the main Hub. “Maybe we can retrace his steps.”

“I don’t think he did it on purpose,Yan,” Jack said, leaning over Ianto’s shoulder. 

Ianto stopped what he was doing and gave his husband a look that was equal parts disbelief and annoyance. “Do we ever get ourselves into these situations on purpose?”

“You’ve got a point there,” Jack conceded. 

After rolling his eyes, Ianto continued isolating the proper CCTV footage. The main Hub had several cameras to eliminate blind spots and provide proper coverage. He brought up the camera with the best angle of Fish’s worktable first. He fast forwarded until Jack moved out of view and then played it at normal speed. He and Jack watched as Fish shook his head slightly, watching the fifty first century man walk away. Then, with a bemused smile on his face, the technician turned to the containment box. At first, Ianto thought Fish’s mistake had been to forgo the protective gloves but Fish put them on before he opened the containment box. He took out the lego piece and set it down onto the table with care. The only thing he did was turn the piece around and look at the bottom, examining its outer surface first. He pushed it to the side and then took the gloves off. He started you lay out his tools to begin working. No sooner had he put them down when two of the screwdrivers rolled off the table. Ianto had heard Fish complain about the table before. The Australian had been meaning to properly level the table for months but hadn’t gotten round to it. It was one of dozens of minor chores that he often put off. Fish bent down to pick up the two screwdrivers. He managed to pick up one and drop it on the table and that was when he froze. 

As far as Ianto and Jack could tell, Fish hadn’t done anything wrong. He hadn’t jostled the table. He hadn’t touched the alien artefact barehanded. He hadn’t even started working on the device. He’d done nothing but take it out of the containment box and put it down. 

“Well, wasn’t that helpful?” Ianto said, with frustration fueled sarcasm. 

“Try the other angles,” Jack said, leaning in closer. 

Ianto split the screen, playing the footage they’d just watched on one side and another angle on the other. The other angles were just as helpful as the first one. 

“You got that from one of the shops?” Jack asked. 

Ianto nodded. “The shopkeeper said a couple of chavs sold it to him. They thought it was a toy.” 

“Did he know where they found it?” 

Ianto shook his head. “He didn’t know. I’m guessing because he didn’t ask.” 

“How long did he have it?” 

“A few months.” 

“Months?!” Jack exclaimed. 

Ianto didn’t miss the annoyance in his husband’s voice. He rolled his eyes and said, “I’m the only one who goes round to the shops, Jack. I have been at basic, you know.” 

“Fish must’ve done something,” Jack said, shaking his head. He pushed Ianto out of the way to play with the footage himself. “Maybe it was something in how he turned it.” 

“It doesn’t look like it,” Ianto replied, waving at the screen. 

“Honey, I’m home!” Mickey called out. He walked in, dropping his rucksack next to Gwen’s workstation. It was temporarily his while she was on leave. 

His wife was behind him, carrying a small containment box. Martha said, “I think it’s one of those soft drinks you were talking about, Ianto. I put it in here just in case.” 

“So what’s the commotion, Jack?” Mickey asked and Jack waved towards Fish’s worktable. He and Martha stared at Fish for a few seconds, not understanding what Jack was saying to them. It didn’t take them long to realise something was wrong. 

“Bloody hell!” Mickey shouted. 

“Oh my God!” Martha exclaimed. “What happened?!”

Jack started to explain, “It’s a-”

“-time lock,” Mickey finished. “I can see for myself, Captain Cheesecake.”  He knelt down, watching Fish carefully. He reached out and touched Fish’s ear.

“Hey, hey, don’t do that,” Jack said, grabbing Mickey’s hand by the wrist and pulling it away. 

“I’m not gonna hurt him,” Mickey insisted. 

“You could hurt him if you move him. It’s time dilation. Inertia’s going to affect him different,” Jack said.  

Mickey rolled his eyes. “I’ve got eyes, Jack. I know that. I’m not going to go shaking him or kicking him.” 

Ianto cleared his throat, nervously. “I, uh, I tripped over him.” 

The three of them glared at Ianto.

“I didn’t see him!” Ianto said, defensive. He gave Jack a look. “And I was rather… distracted.” 

“Is that what you two are calling it these days?” Martha asked. She ran the vitals scanner over him. “It says he’s dead.” 

“He’s moving too slow for that thing. Don’t bother, Martha,” Jack said, waving off the scanner.

“Well, looks like I know what my priority one is now,” Mickey said. He sat down and started examining the lego piece device. “You’ve never seen anything like this before, Jack?” 

“Time dilation? Sure. This thing?” Jack said, waving at the lego piece. “Nope.” 

“Ianto? Can you do me a favour and search the archives?” Mickey asked, not looking up from his task. “Time dilation. Time displacement. Time locks. Time… anything. Anything with this configuration, really. The usual…” 

“Sure, Mickey,” Ianto said. He turned towards his workstation so he could begin searching the digital archive. 

“Keep me updated. Martha? You, me and Yan will handle all the rift alerts for now.” Jack started to walk back towards his office. 

Ianto leaned backwards in his chair, brushing his arm as he walked past. He asked, quietly, “What do you want me to tell Henry?” 

Jack’s rested his hands on his hips. “Nothing yet. I don’t want to worry him until we have to. If Mickey figures this out, this’ll be just a funny story Fish tells him when he gets home.” 

“And if he doesn’t?” Ianto asked, concerned. “The wedding’s next week, Jack.” 

The flicker of doubt crossed Jack’s face but he lifted his chin, jutting it slightly and said, “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”


	4. Chapter 4

They were thankful for a relatively quiet rift. Mickey was left to his task, mostly undisturbed. As the day wore on, Mickey glanced at the clock more and more. Sure Fish’s wedding was in a week but there was a more immediate deadline. Even though Torchwood was a busy job with long hours, Fish and Henry made the most of their time, together and apart. Henry would often ring Fish, knowing that he couldn’t answer, just so he could leave a loving message that Fish could listen to later. The couple would often send texts and messages back and forth throughout the day. Fish’s silence was likely already troubling Henry. Time was running out. Henry had no idea that Fish had been crouched under his worktable picking up the same fucking tools for the past nine hours. 

Ianto had ordered dinner for the team an hour ago. Mickey had been picking at his food while examining the lego piece. The half eaten slice of stone cold pizza was on a plate next to the dark grey outer casing that Mickey had only just managed to remove. The interior of the lego piece made no sense to Ianto. There was no conventional circuitry or wires. There were no moving parts he could see. It didn’t make Ianto feel any better that Mickey seemed to have no better idea about it than he did. As the minutes ticked away, Mickey cast more and more glances at Fish’s mobile which had been vibrating at ever shortening intervals. He rubbed at his eyes, sighing as Ianto put down the mug of coffee next to him. 

“You’ve got to tell Henry something, mate,” Mickey said, speaking to Ianto in a low voice. He waved at Fish’s mobile. “That’s been going mad for the past half hour.” 

“You don’t have anything yet?” Ianto asked. 

“Not yet,” Mickey said, sadly. “I’ve seen a device with guts like this before but never in anything I’ve tried to figure out. I have no bloody idea how Fish accidentally activated it.” 

“Fuck,” Ianto muttered. “Jack didn’t want to tell Henry. He doesn’t want to worry him.” 

“Look, mate, I know how Henry gets but keeping him the dark? It’s making it worse,” Mickey said. They both looked at Fish’s mobile which was ringing… again. “He must be losing his bloody mind.” 

Ianto nodded. “Keep working. I’ll talk to Jack.” 

He walked away as Mickey turned back to Fish’s worktable. Without knocking, he walked straight into Jack’s office. The older man was watching the CCTV footage of Fish for what was probably the thousandth time. 

“Anything?” Ianto asked. 

Jack shook his head and rubbed his eyes. “Nothing. I’ve watched every angle. It just went off by itself. Bam.” 

Every one of them had watched and rewatched the same video clips, trying to glean something from Fish’s actions before the time lock began. It had been fruitless. All he’d done was moved the bloody thing from one spot to another. 

“We need to talk to Henry,” Ianto said. 

Jack looked at his watch. “I didn’t realise it was so late.” He leaned back in his chair, scrubbing at his face. 

“Do you want me to tell him?” Ianto offered. 

Jack shook his head. After scrubbing at his face one more time, he let his hands fall to the desk with a thud. “No, I should be doing it.” He let out a sigh. “Can you gimme a minute, Yan?” 

“Sure, Jack,” Ianto said, stepping back and out of the office. He shut the door behind him. He walked towards Fish and Mickey. The screwdriver that had begun its fall so many hours ago was on the table. “Jack’s ringing Henry.”

“Ouch,” Mickey said with a wince. He rubbed at his eye with the back of his hand. “This alien tech isn’t really my thing.” 

“You work in UNIT’s technologies department,” Ianto said, with a small laugh. 

“Sussing this stuff out is R and D’s job. I work in the compatibilities division. I get our technology to emulate or interface with what’s alien.” Mickey rubbed at his eyes again. “What a bloody piece of irony, isn’t it? Technician ensnared by tech that we need the technician to suss out.” 

Ianto tried to be optimistic. “You’ve only been at it a day, mate. Maybe you should go home? Get some rest? Look at it with fresh eyes in the morning?” 

“I’m fine. All the pick-me-up I needed,” he said as he drank from the coffee mug. He put it back down and set to working again. 

Ianto had wanted to argue. He wanted to tell Mickey that Fish wasn’t exactly going anywhere fast and that all this would still be here in the morning but he didn’t. He saw the determined look in Mickey’s eyes so he just nodded and turned to the situation at hand. 

“Do we know how much slower he’s experiencing time?” 

Mickey shook his head. “I’ve been focusing on the device rather than the ratio since he’s obviously moving so much slower. I only got a rough guess.” He picked up the screwdriver. It was the very same one that was frozen in the time lock with Fish. 

“Is that safe?” Ianto asked, quirking an eyebrow.

“Yeah, watch this,” Mickey said, with a small laugh. He held the screwdriver over Ianto’s head and dropped it. 

Ianto ducked to avoid the metal tool but it didn’t fall. It stayed suspended in the air. He took a step to the side, moving out from underneath it, not taking his eyes off it. “Well, that’s something you don’t see every day.” 

“It’s still inside the time dilation even though I can interact with it.” Mickey said. He opened his laptop. “I set up a high speed camera. Did some calculations. I had to make a few assumptions though.” 

“Such as?” 

Mickey tapped the calculations on his screen. “Like the only thing different about the screwdriver is time. I’m assuming it’s experiencing gravity, air resistance and other physical forces the same as it did before.” 

“Big assumption,” Ianto said.

“Yeah, but I think it’s sound,” he said. He hit a few keys and Ianto watched as more calculations moved across the screen. “So I dropped it from a set height, recorded it with the high speed camera. I crunched the numbers and came up with a rough idea. It’s looking like for every second or so the screwdriver and Fish experience, we experience four hours, thirty minutes and change.” 

“Well, his hand’s on the edge of the table now,” Ianto said, waving at Fish. His movements weren’t noticeable if you stared straight at him. It was easier to notice changes over periods of time. It was more like someone taking time lapse photographs of weight loss or watching a child grow up when you only saw them once a year. “He’ll probably move to pick up that other screwdriver up next.” 

“Exactly. What takes us a couple seconds is gonna take him all night.” He let out a small chuckle. “Sorry, I don’t mean to laugh. It’s funny, but it’s not funny, you know?” 

Ianto nodded. “I know what you mean. I have this childish this urge to tie his laces together or move that screwdriver.” 

At that, Mickey let out a roaring laugh. He immediately sobered. “No, not a nice thing to do at all.” 

“Not at all,” Ianto agreed. He cleared his throat, sobering. “If we moved that screwdriver, would he notice?”

“To him, it would look like it vanished into thin air,” Mickey said with a shrug.

“We should probably work on a way to communicate with him,” Ianto said, running his fingers through his hair. He hooked his finger into his tie and loosened it. “Maybe a slowed recording or ultra-low frequency noises…” 

“Probably no need to go that high tech, mate. A note’d be fine,” Mickey said, shrugging. “Leave it taped to the table. He’ll see it eventually… probably tomorrow at this rate.” 

At that moment, a pressure blossomed between Ianto’s temples. He turned and walked towards the cogwheel door as fast as he could. It was barely in time. No sooner had Ianto sensed Henry’s presence than the proximity alarms went off. He’d only just made it to the cogwheel door when it rolled aside to reveal an overwrought Henry Fitzroy.  

“Where is he, Ianto?” Henry asked. 

“Henry, there’s been an incident-” 

He didn’t get to finish. Henry’s mind had already leapt to the worst case scenario and he tried to bolt for the autopsy bay. 

Ianto grabbed Henry’s arm, stopping him. “Henry, wait!” 

“Unhand me!” he snarled. 

Jack had come out of his office in a run. He helped Ianto restrain Fish’s panicked fiancé. 

“Henry, wait, you’ve gotta listen!” Jack shouted. 

“Henry! Calm down!” Ianto begged. 

The Englishman continued to struggle against the two other immortals. Martha saw the commotion and immediately ran back into the autopsy bay to retrieve a syringe. She managed to plunge the needle into Henry’s arm, avoiding Jack and Ianto. The effect was almost immediate. Henry shook his head and slumped down. He was still awake but looked dazed.  

Ianto cast Jack an angry look. He took him by the arm, dragging him aside. “What the fuck did you tell him, Jack?” 

“He didn’t give me a chance to tell him anything!” Jack said, defensive. “All I said was that there’d been an accident with Fish-”

“Excellent choice of words,” Ianto hissed over him.

“-then he hung up on me! You’re the one who said we should give him access codes!” He whirled on Martha. “What did you give him?”  

“It’s just a light sedative,” she replied. 

“That’s _light?”_ Jack cried. 

“He’s still conscious isn’t he?” she shouted back. Her hands were on her hips and she was giving Jack a scowl. 

Jack knelt down after giving Martha an eye roll worthy of Ianto. “Henry?” 

“Is he… Is he…?” he stammered. 

“He’s alive, Henry,” Jack said, firmly. “He’s _alive_.” 

The relief that washed over Henry’s face was profound. His eyes began to well with tears of gratitude. He asked, “Why is he here and not in hospital?”

“It’s not that kind of accident,” Jack said. He helped Henry to his feet and led him to the tattered sofa. He slowly and clearly explained what had happened, making sure that Henry was lucid enough to understand through Martha’s sedative. Henry had withstood all sorts of strange goings on since he’d become involved with Torchwood’s technician but sometimes Ianto wondered if they didn’t stretch the sixteenth century man’s sanity to its limits. 

Henry stood up, looking a little unsteady and said, “Take me to him.”  

“You understand you can’t touch him, right?” Jack said, as delicately as he could. “He can’t hear us. He can’t see us.” 

Henry closed his eyes and repeated, “Take me to him.” 

Jack turned on his heel and walked towards Fish’s worktable. At first, Henry didn’t see anything wrong. Fish looked completely normal, bent under his table to pick something up. 

“Joe?” 

“He can’t hear us,” Ianto said, repeating what Jack had said earlier. “He can’t see us either.” 

Unconsciously reaching for the person he loved, Henry bent down to put a hand on Fish’s back. Ianto anticipated the movement and took Henry’s arm, stopping him. Henry was so upset that all their explanations were going in one ear and out the other. Martha’s sedative probably wasn’t helping either.

With his hand firmly on Henry’s arm, Ianto said, “You can’t touch him. Lifting him up would be like him driving his car into a brick wall without a seatbelt.” 

“Is he aware?” 

“He doesn’t know anything’s wrong yet. Time’s passing for him but it’s going slower than it is for us,” Jack said, patiently. “He still thinks everything’s fine.”

“How long does he believe has passed?” 

“A second for him is about four and a half hours for us,” Mickey said. He did some rough calculations in his head. “He’s been in the time dilation eight hours so we reckon he’s experienced maybe two seconds.” 

Henry swallowed hard around the lump in his throat. 

“I’m working on it, Henry,” Mickey said, soothingly. He reached up and put his hand on Henry’s shoulder, giving it a squeeze. 

Knowing exactly how much sedative she’d injected into Henry’s arm, Martha said, delicately, “Maybe you should lie down and rest.” 

“With all due respect, Martha, I’m not going anywhere,” he replied. He pulled over one of the desk chairs and sat down. “I hope I will not be in your way, Mickey.”


	5. Chapter 5

None of them had wanted to break for the night or to leave Henry alone but he’d insisted he was fine and urged everyone to get some sleep. Even he was beginning to acknowledge that while the situation appeared dire, the reality was very different. While time was a factor, Fish wasn’t going anywhere. So everyone had gone home for a good night’s rest. Ianto had gone down into the bunker, leaving Henry alone. It had taken Ianto a while to fall asleep and he didn’t stay asleep long. He’d woken after only a few short hours, blinking into the dark bunker as Jack snored softly beside him. He tried to go back to sleep, but after nearly an hour of laying awake with his eyes shut, his frustration had won over. He pushed the blankets back and rolled out of bed. He rubbed at his neck and sighed. He didn’t want to disrupt Jack. Instead of showering or changing clothes, he just climbed the ladder in his pyjamas.  

He’d crept along quietly, in case Henry was asleep on the sofa in Jack’s office but he wasn’t there. Nor was he on the sofa in the main Hub. He doubted Henry would wander too far from Fish and have a kip the staterooms or Miranda’s old rooms. In fact, Ianto doubted Henry would be able to sleep at all. After setting the coffee to brew, he decided to check on Fish’s progress and that was when he found Henry. 

The Duke had dozed off in Fish’s desk chair, his head lolled to one side. Ianto crept into the autopsy bay. He opened the cupboard and took out one of the blankets. He stepped close to Henry, gently laying it down over him. He winced at the angle of Henry’s head. The Duke would have quite the crick in his neck if he stayed that way but Ianto suspected Henry hadn’t intended to fall asleep sitting up in the chair. The last thing he wanted to do was wake him so he left him at the awkward angle. 

When the coffee pot beeped, Ianto turned for the kitchen. That was when he Ianto noticed a piece of paper taped to the top of the worktable, next to Fish’s hand. It looked as if Henry had used an entire roll of tape so it wouldn’t move. He tilted his head, reading Henry’s tightly slanted script. 

 

_Joe, you’re experiencing a time dilation. Keep calm and stay where you are. We’re working on it. I love you - Henry_

 

They’d been planning on leaving Fish so me sort of note but Henry had beaten them to it. Ianto debated adding to the message but decided against it. There was too much tape for him to write on the paper anyway. Instead, he leaned over and firmly taped a pen to the desk next to the paper even if it would take Fish an entire day to write an answer. 

He wanted to go about his morning routine but walking round the Hub would mean he’d risk waking Henry as he sensed Ianto’s presence moving in and out of range. It was a small fluke that Henry hadn't woken when Ianto had come up the stairs. Ianto turned in place, mentally calculating the areas of the Hub that would be within range so that he wouldn’t disturb his friend. He returned to the kitchen, pouring himself a mug of coffee. Then, he went about as many of his morning chores as he could which wasn’t many since he was confined mostly to the main Hub, the kitchen and Jack’s office. He cleaned out the cupboards and binned the old takeaway from the fridge. He tried to be as quiet as he could. Finally, the light went on in Jack’s office. Relieved, Ianto poured a mug of coffee for his husband and brought it to him. 

“You were up early,” Jack said, loudly, accepting the mug. 

“Shhh,” Ianto said, waving at him. “Henry’s asleep.” 

Jack craned his neck, looking out his window, and then nodded. In a softer voice, he said, “Sorry.” 

“I’m going to take a shower and get dressed,” Ianto said. “Could you send a message to Martha and Mickey? Ask them to take the invisible lift down or come through the garage? I don’t want to wake Henry with the proximity alarms.” 

Jack nodded and took out his mobile. He began tapping out a text and gave Ianto a lusty look over the top of the phone. “Want some company?” 

Ianto leaned across Jack’s desk, kissing him warmly. “I’d take you up on that any other time. Keep an eye on him okay?” 

Jack nodded and gave him another brief kiss before settling back to his paperwork. Ianto showered and dressed in short order. He climbed back up into Jack’s office which was empty. He looked out the window and saw that the rest of the team had arrived. Henry was also awake, casting the occasional glance to Mickey as he worked. Ianto sighed, he’d hoped Henry would sleep longer. He couldn’t have been down in the bunker more than twenty minutes. 

Ianto strode across the Hub and into the kitchen. After distributing the coffee, he went down into the archives. Organising the Torchwood archive was his life’s work. He was exceedingly proud of the progress he’d made but he was also grateful he was immortal as organising such a massive collection was something that would take longer than a single lifetime. He’d managed to get most of the information Mickey needed from the digitised portion of the archive fast enough. Now, he had the gritty task of sorting through the portions of the archive that weren’t in the digital database. 

He’d started working to organise Torchwood Three’s archive as a cover for his care of Lisa. He hadn’t read every single file, but he’d managed to skim most of them. This was when he relied on his nearly eidetic memory to retrieve any file or report that had anything to do with time locks, time dilation or time bubbles. He loaded them onto his trolley and brought them up to Mickey who read them in between tinkering with the device. 

By lunchtime, Fish was standing. To Ianto’s disappointment, he wasn’t reading the note Henry had left for him. He was bending over to lift the leg of his jeans. The same leg Ianto had bruised when he’d tripped over him. 

“You can put these back, mate,” Mickey said, waving at the reports. 

“Nothing useful?” he asked.

Mickey shook his head, his frustration obvious. “Nothing.” 

Ianto knew of one more place he could look. He shifted back and forth. The nervous fidgeting was a outward expression of the debate inside him. He hadn’t wanted to do this. After concealing his sword inside his coat, he walked towards the garage. “I’ll be back in a bit.” 

“Where you off to then?” Mickey called out. 

“I’m… I’ll be back in a bit,” he repeated, not answering the question. 

He got into his car and drove to the storage units, his hands gripping the wheel. He parked, breathing carefully. It was with heavy feet that he walked to the correct unit. He hesitated with the lock in one hand and his keys in the other. With a sigh, he pushed the key forward and turned it. The lock popped open and he opened the unit’s door. He braced himself as he tilted his head up and looked around at the boxes. He blinked rapidly, almost convincing himself it was the dust making his eyes water.

“You forgive me, don’t you, Tosh?” he said, softly as he opened the first box. Then he opened another and another. 

It took him a few hours to carefully comb through each one of Tosh’s belongings. While it was a standing rule that no alien tech leave the Hub, plenty of Torchwood operatives had ignored the rule, including Tosh. She was known to have a great many side projects. She worked at home and at the Hub. When he, Gwen and Jack had boxed away Tosh’s things, they hadn’t inventoried them. They’d just packed, focused more on their grief and sadness than her possessions. Ianto remembered everything he put into these boxes, of course. He also remembered seeing a small box with the Torchwood logo on it in Gwen’s hands. At the time, he hadn’t said anything. He hadn’t cared, really. But now, he couldn’t ignore the fact that it might be pertinent to Fish’s situation. Tosh had successfully developed the time lock that had saved his and Gwen’s lives. Ianto didn’t understand the concepts involved in the slightest but he figured a time lock and a time dilation had to be similar. With such an immense project, Ianto wouldn’t be surprised if Tosh had worked on it at home. If she had, there’d be evidence here. Maybe there was a clue that would help them save Fish.  

He’d only managed to get through about half of the storage unit before he was mentally and emotionally exhausted. He felt like a pincushion. Each one of Tosh’s possessions was a small needle sliding slowly into his heart, leaving behind a small hole full of hurt. They all added up into a greater ache that left him feeling weak. He sat down hard on one of the boxes. It crushed a bit under his weight but he didn’t notice. He began to cry with Tosh’s leather coat in his hands. He folded it carefully and put it back. He looked at the rest of the boxes, unable to muster the strength to open them. He swallowed past the lump in his throat as his mobile beeped. 

 _Go away…_ he thought, rubbing at his eyes. He didn’t want to answer his phone but it could be the team needing his help. Ianto’s sense of duty was greater than his own grief. He thrust aside his feelings, and with a deep sigh, he took his phone out and read the message. It was from Jack, asking where he was. It may have only been a text but Ianto could tell there was no accusation, only loving concern. He thought about lying for a minute, but instead, told Jack precisely where he was. 

 _Are you okay?_ was Jack’s immediate response. 

 _No,_ Ianto answered, truthfully. A split second after the text went through, his mobile began to ring. He accepted the call, grateful to hear Jack’s voice. 

“Hi, Jack… No… No… I thought maybe there’d be a file here or something… She worked on things from home all the time. Remember when she took that scanner home?… No… no…” Ianto broke off, taking a deep breath. “No, you don’t have to come… I’ll be all right. It’s just harder than I thought it’d be… I don’t have much left… Would you stay on the phone with me, though? Thanks… I love you too…” He stood up and turned to the box he’d just crushed. He tried to push the sides back up and failed. He opened it and started sifting through the contents. “No, I said you don’t need to. By the time you get here, I’ll be done…” He tilted his head, holding the phone up with his shoulder. He picked up a small box of old style floppy disks and an old storage drive. The box of disks had the Torchwood logo on it. “Actually, I think I may have found something. I’ll be back soon… Yup… Yup… I’m better now. I’ll get through it faster if I don’t have to hold my phone… I will. I promise… Yeah, of course…” 

Ianto rang off and put his mobile back in his pocket. Now that he’d found something, it was easier to put aside his feelings. It felt like he was searching with a purpose, rather than nosing through Tosh’s things. He dug in the box a bit more and found some more floppy disks. In the end, he decided to just take the entire box. He couldn’t believe Gwen had done this. Yes, they’d all been distraught and he could see missing one or two things but an entire box full of Torchwood items? He looked back at the storage unit with the box in his hands. There were at least a dozen boxes he hadn’t searched through. He stood there for a few minutes, deciding what to do. He could go back to the Hub or he could continue looking through Tosh’s things. He gritted his teeth and put the box down by the door. He decided to continue. He did not want to come back here and considering how much Gwen had missed, he couldn’t dismiss the possibility there was more. 

He worked his way back into the storage unit, carefully going through each box. It was hard to begin the search again. The next box he opened was full of personal items but his decision turned out to be a prudent one and made the emotional drain worth it. The second to last box he searched had an external hard drive tucked in it along with some clothes and other odds and ends. There was also another box of floppy disks. 

With the items in hand, he closed up the storage unit. The sun was dipping down. He’d been there all afternoon. He got into his car and sat there for a minute, collecting himself. Again, he sent up a silent apology to Tosh and then drove back to the Hub. When he pulled into the garage, he wasn’t surprised to find Jack waiting for him. His husband had likely followed his car on the CCTV all the way from the storage facility. The moment Ianto got out of the car, Jack pulled him into a fierce hug. 

“You didn’t have to go alone,” he said, softly. 

“I didn’t think it would be as hard as it was,” Ianto repeated. Combing through Tosh’s belongings still had him shaken but that feeling was rapidly leaving him now that Jack was here. He buried his face in Jack’s shoulder, breathing in the fifty first century pheromones and felt grounded again. 

“I love you,” Jack said, kissing his ear.

“I love you too,” Ianto replied, hugging him tighter. 

Ianto leaned back and Jack took his face in both his hands, kissing him gently. They stood there like that for a moment, drawing strength from each other. Jack moved first, backing away and opening the passenger door for the box. They walked back to the Hub, side by side. He put the box down on Ianto’s desk. 

“Where’s Henry?” 

“Stretching his legs up top,” Mickey replied. Ianto gave him a surprised look and Mickey smirked. “Jack made him. What’s all that, then?” 

“Some of Tosh’s things,” Ianto replied, flatly. 

Martha was standing behind her husband and lifted her head at the mention of the name. “What made you think to look there?” 

Jack opened the box and said, “For Tosh, tinkering wasn’t a job. It was a state of being. Oh, man!” He reached into the box, lifting out Tosh’s old datebook. He started flipping through the pages. 

Ianto saw the slightly disapproving stares from Mickey and Martha. He said, sheepishly, “The box had a lot of Torchwood items in it. I just brought the whole thing.” 

Jack let out a sad laugh. He turned the book around, his finger pointing at the date. “She had June twentieth circled in red.” 

Ianto’s smile was broad but tinged with sadness. “Tommy.” 

“Tommy,” Jack replied. He carefully closed the book and put it back into the box. This time, he took out the items of interest - the storage devices. He shook the box of floppy disks. “Man, I hope we have something in the archive that can still read these.” 

“We do,” Ianto said, laying his sword down against his desk. 

“I’ll get on this straight away,” Mickey said, taking the box from him. He opened it and his face scrunched with confusion. He dumped the contents out into his palm. It looked like magnifying loupe, similar to what photographers use to look at negatives. “This isn’t a disk.” 

Ianto saw disbelief and anger spread across Jack’s face. He snatched the item out of Mickey’s hand. He said, angrily, “This is why we put the possessions of former operatives into storage. Never know what you crazy kids’ll take home with you!” 

“She must’ve taken it from the archive,” Ianto said. He tried to take the item from Jack but he pulled his hand back. “What’s it for, do you reckon?” 

“For storage. It’s a neural scanner. It stores memories.” Jack’s face turned sad and disappointed. He said quietly, almost to himself, “Only one scan at a time.”  

He handed the loupe over to Mickey who handed it to Ianto and said, “I guess you should put it back, mate.” He picked up the external harddrive and the other disks. “I’ll get to sorting this lot.” 

Ianto held the loupe in his hand. Tosh had probably figured the thing out and used it on herself to test it. It felt wrong to store it in the archive. Tosh’s memories were more important than some artefact or random file. He turned towards the autopsy bay and took the stairs down into the morgue. After giving Owen’s empty drawer an affectionate kick, he knelt down. He opened Tosh’s drawer and swallowed hard. He could see the outline of her delicate face, distorted through the foggy plastic of the body bag. He put the loupe carefully down beside the bag and shut the drawer.


	6. Chapter 6

After Ianto shut Tosh’s drawer, he went back upstairs, running his hand over Cameron’s drawer as he went. All of the other drawers had only a small handwritten or typed name tag. Cameron’s was the only one with a picture - a small drawing Henry had done of the Scottish doctor. Ianto felt a tug at his heart. He missed Cameron terribly. He’d been with the team a short time but his effect on all of them had been profound. Every day, he was reminded of Cameron’s absence as he continued to care for the young man’s aging cat, Six. Unfortunately, Ianto hadn’t seen the cat with his own eyes since Cameron’s death. He’d seen her appear on some of the CCTV. The food he left continued to disappear and her litter pan still required cleaning, so he assumed the old feline was still alive. He wished he could provide a better environment for Cameron’s beloved pet but if she was isolating herself there was nothing he could do. 

Before he turned back towards the autopsy bay, he flicked his eyes over the drawers. Right now, he knew only a few of the occupants but a dark part of his mind, in a wicked snicker, told him that one day he would know more than he didn’t. He swallowed and left the morgue. When he reached the autopsy bay, Martha was waiting for him. 

“Hi, Ianto,” she said, brightly. 

“Martha,” he replied with a nod. He walked past her. “I was about to order dinner for the team. Any requests?”

Instead of answering him, she reached his arm. She gently pulled him towards her, whispering in his ear. “In a few minutes, Mickey’s going to create a false rift alert. He and I are going to go and investigate.” 

Ianto was confused. He furrowed his brow at her and asked, “What? Why?” 

“Shhh!” she said, looking over his shoulder into the main Hub. “Ten minutes after Mickey and I leave, Jack’s going to come get you. You two act like you’re going to have a bit of a romp. Take the emergency route out of the bunker up to the docks. Mickey and I will be waiting for you there.” 

Before Ianto could question her further, she turned on her heel and walked away. No sooner had she reached the top of the stairs than the false rift alert sounded. Ianto overheard Mickey say he needed a break and saw them walk towards the garage. Confused, he walked into the kitchen to wait for Jack. He passed the time doing the washing up. He had no idea why Martha was insisting on this deception but he would play along. Hopefully when they all met up, he’d have an explanation. 

Ten minutes later, precisely when Martha had said, Jack came up behind him. He put his arms around his waist, his thumbs teasing the button of his trousers. Ianto did as Martha had told him. He allowed Jack to lead him down into their bedroom. The minute they were down the ladder, Jack shifted their bed, revealing a small panel. Had Jack not shown it to him, Ianto never would have found it on his own. It was nearly seamless with the bunker floor. It wouldn’t open all the way because of the bed but he and Jack managed to fit down into the small tunnel with it partially open. Jack wedged a piece of wood into the trapdoor so they could make their way back later. When the door shut, there was no way to open it from this side. 

Hunched, they made their way to the end where there was another rusty hatchway. Jack turned the wheel on the door. They had to prop this door open as well as there was no handle on the other side. Ianto expected to end up by the docks but it was another passageway. It was clear this was meant as a one way escape. Nothing short of cutting torches or explosives could get you back to the bunker. This new tunnel looked to be part of a water drainage system. They followed it and exited through a manhole by the docks. As promised, Mickey and Martha were both waiting, leaning against the SUV. 

“What’s all this about, Martha?” Ianto asked. 

“It’s about Fish,” she said, nervously looking up at the camera. 

“I disabled it,” Mickey said, following her gaze. “Go on. Tell them what you told me last night.” 

“Well…” Jack said with a leer. 

“Oi, not everything is a double entendre, Captain Cheesecake,” Mickey said, rolling his eyes. 

“Yeah it is,” Jack smirked. 

“Jack,” Ianto warned. “Why are we out here, Martha?” 

“I didn’t think Henry would want us talking about Fish’s situation without him and I didn’t want to meet somewhere in the Hub where he could overhear us. I don’t want to worry him.” She took a deep breath. Even though Mickey had assured them that the camera was disabled, she still kept her voice low. “Look, I know we’re all talking about getting Fish out of this and back to normal before the wedding but I think that’s the least of it.” 

“What do you mean?” Jack asked, unconcerned. “He’s moving slower than us. It’s not like he’s going to grow old and die before we can figure this out. Worst comes to worst, we postpone the wedding, feed his sister some random story and the only loss is the corkage.” 

“But Fish moving slower _is_ the whole point,” Martha said. She held her hand out in front of her, emphatic. “It came to me last night. The fact that he’s moving slower is just as dangerous as if he were moving faster.” 

“Why?” Ianto asked, just as confused. He’d also thought the fact that Fish was moving slower to be an advantage. They could, conceivably take all the time they needed to figure this out. 

“Tell them what you told me,” Martha said to Mickey. 

Mickey took a screwdriver out of his back pocket. He looked to his left and right, ensuring no one was looking and then held it out in front of him and let it go. Just as when he’d dropped it over Ianto’s head, it stayed suspended in midair. 

“That’s the screwdriver Fish was holding,” he said. He reached out and took it back, putting it into his pocket. “It’s still experiencing time slower than us no matter where I take it or how I interact with it. I don’t think the device is constantly affecting Fish and this tool. I’d expect proximity to be a factor if that was the case but it isn’t. You or I stand close to that device and nothing happens. I take this thing out of the Hub and it’s still slowed down. I think it changed something about Fish and this screwdriver, fundamentally, probably on a quantum level.” 

Since Fish was absent, Ianto quoted, “‘Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. Sit with a pretty girl for an hour and it seems like a minute.’”

“Exactly,” Mickey said, pointing at Ianto. 

Jack rolled his eyes a bit. “I understand time dilation and basic relativity, Mickey. I don’t understand what this has to do with Fish.” 

“Because only Fish and this screwdriver are part of the time dilation. The rest of the world is fine,” Martha said. She waved around and began to gesture as she spoke. “Our bodies are constantly bombarded from the outside world.” She held out her hand, counting off points on her fingers. “Every one of Fish’s physiologic responses is delayed - sensory processing, inflammation, immunity, clotting… Leave a piece of uncooked meat out on the counter and it’ll rot in a day. We don’t rot because we’re alive. Our immune system is keeping us from being overrun by bacteria, fungi and a host of other contaminants. Technically, Fish is immune compromised, not in a traditional sense where his immune system is damaged, but more in the sense that it’s suppressed - not by drugs or disease but by _time_. Don’t you see? It’s just _him_. Our bacteria, our viruses out here? They’re all moving at our speed, not his.” 

“His immune system is reacting so slowly that infection could kill him before his body even realises it’s sick,” Ianto realised. 

“Exactly,” Martha said. 

“How do we protect him?” Jack asked. His brow was furrowed deeply with concern. 

“We protect him by bringing this to a close, fast as we can,” replied Martha. 

“What about a clean room environment?” Jack suggested. 

“I think there’s too much potential for injuring him while we’re setting something like that up. He’d see it appear almost instantly. That’d probably confuse and scare him,” Mickey said. 

Jack shifted his weight back and forth as he crossed his hands over his chest. He looked worried and frustrated. “Where are we at?” 

He replied, “I’m getting no where fast, Jack.” 

“That’s not what I want to hear,” Jack said. He waved at Martha. “Especially after hearing that.” 

“There are limits to what I can do until I know exactly what it’s doing to him,” Mickey said, defensive. “It’s not easy with Henry breathing down my neck every few seconds either.” 

Ianto put his hand on Jack’s arm. “Jack. Not helping.” 

“Sorry, Mickey,” he said. 

Mickey gave Jack a weak smile in return. “I know the clock’s slowly ticking… sorry,” He winced at his own unintentional and very bad pun. “If that device did this to him, I’m guessing it can undo it. But there’s only so much I can do. If I disassemble it and accidentally break it-”

“Fish’d be stuck forever,” Jack said. 

“How long do you think we have, Martha?” Jack asked. 

“Before he gets sick? I don’t know. That’s part of the problem. He could already be sick and I wouldn’t know it,” she said. This time Ianto could hear the anxiety in her voice. “Every sign of disease we have comes from the body’s responses - responses that are so delayed in Fish, he doesn’t even read as alive by the scanners. He won’t show signs until it’s too late.” 

Jack scratched at his head. “There’s nothing we can do but step it up. What if we bring in UNIT?” 

Mickey nodded. “I could have a top research team here in a few hours.”  

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Jack,” Ianto said. His own brow creased as he thought. “We’d be introducing potentially dozens of new people into the Hub who could be incubating Lord knows what.” 

“We could be incubating Lord knows what,” Martha pointed out. 

“What if we bring in a single expert? UNIT has to have someone versed in the quantum mechanics and relative dynamics for this sort of situation,” Jack said.

“We don’t, Jack. This is next level shit,” Mickey said, waving down at the Hub. He saw Jack’s frustrated expression and said, “This is the twenty first century, not the fifty first. We’d need more than one brain working on this. We’d probably need half the bloody research department.” 

Jack stood there for a few minutes with his arms crossed and his chin tucked into his chest. He was deep in thought for a few minutes. “Ianto? What did you do with that neural scanner?” 

“What?” Ianto asked, not understanding the non-sequitur or the odd tone to his husband’s voice.  

“The neural scanner you found in Tosh’s things. What did you do with it?” 

The scanner belonged in the archive. He shouldn’t have left it in Tosh’s drawer. It seemed an odd time and place to bring up his breech of protocol. Ianto shifted nervously and then cleared his throat. “I put it in her drawer with her body.” 

“I need you to get it,” he said, not looking up. 

“What for?” Martha asked, also confused. 

“We’re going to download Tosh’s consciousness off of it,” he said. 

 _“WHAT?!”_ all three of the others exclaimed at once. 

“By the fifty first century, there are some pretty heavy restrictions on cloning but when it was first invented, it was pretty much a free-for-all. In the beginning, it was a way for the Empire’s elite and wealthy to achieve a sort of immortality. You scan your consciousness, clone yourself and then have that scan uploaded into your new body. It was outlawed pretty quick, but there are some black market ways…” Jack trailed off. He shook his head. “If Tosh scanned herself with that device right, then it’s got a complete imprint of her on it - a perfect copy of her consciousness.” 

“Jack, I remember Tosh fiddling with that thing,” Ianto said. He hated to dash his husband’s hopes. He clearly remembered Tosh had had a different opinion on the scanner’s function. “She said it was a medical scanner. She wanted to figure it out… for Owen.” 

“Mickey? Martha? Can you guys give us a minute please?” Jack said, quietly. 

Confused, the two of them got back into the SUV, shutting themselves inside. Jack took Ianto by the arm, leading him a respectable distance away, back towards the manhole. He crossed his arms over his chest and jutted out his chin. Ianto recognised the defensive posture. 

“I know it’s not a medical scanner, Yan. I’m positive,” he said. His voice was low but full of certainty. There was a hint of shame on the edge of it. He wouldn’t meet Ianto’s eye and instead, was looking at some point over Ianto’s shoulder. 

“What aren’t you telling me, Jack?” Ianto asked, darkly. 

“I know it’s a memory imprinter because… because I’ve used it.”  

The horrifying truth of what Jack was saying crept into Ianto’s mind. He swallowed, angrily not wanting to believe it. He backed away from Jack. The look of shame and panic on Jack’s face was all the answer Ianto needed but, tight lipped, he ordered, “Say it.” 

“Ianto…” 

“SAY IT!” he barked.

Jack at least had the balls to look him in the eyes when he finally did say, “I know it’s a memory imprinter, because I used it on you.”  

Ianto swallowed past the lump in his throat. He turned away from Jack feeling so violated. The anger bubbled in his chest and then exploded. He turned around, his fist flying through the air. It hit Jack like a tonne of bricks, the immortal man falling to the grass. 

“You unbelievable bastard!” he shouted. 

Mickey and Martha both ran from the SUV. Martha crouched down next to Jack. Mickey stood in front of Ianto, his outstretched hand against his chest trying to put distance between the two of them. 

“Easy, mate!” he said. 

“Is that all I am to you, Jack? A memory imprint you can fucking clone over and over again?” Ianto spat. 

Martha and Mickey both looked nervously back and forth between the two spouses.

In a small voice, Jack said, “Ianto…”

“NO! I don’t want to hear whatever sick, twisted rationale you’ve concocted!” He pushed forward against Mickey, leaning in at Jack with his finger pointed at him. “If you think I’m going to let you bring back Tosh, like she’s some sort of fucking xerox to be stored away, and yanked back like some fucking file or artefact in the archive, you’re wrong! She deserves better than that. I won’t let you desecrate her memory… her sacrifice…” 

Jack got a determined look on his face. He stood up, pushing away Martha’s concerned hands. “We have to save Fish.” 

Ianto shouted, not caring they were out in the open and anyone could hear him. “Sodding Owen all over again! When does it end, Jack? Where’s the line? How far are you going to go?” 

“This is different, Ianto!” He cast a meaningful look at Martha and Mickey and then stared dead into his eyes and said, emphasizing every syllable, “Timelines.” 

Ianto saw the intensity of Jack’s gaze, willing Ianto to hear what he wasn’t saying. The reason for the lump in Ianto’s throat changed. He had never understood why Jack had been so keen on hiring Fish. Sure the man was a genius but he was a electrochemist. It wasn’t a skill set they regularly required but Jack had been so insistent. Like tumblers in a lock, Ianto saw everything slotting into place. Now, he also understood the strange starstruck way Jack had looked at Fish in those first few weeks. 

“You recruited Fish even though Mandy was so dead set against it. He’s supposed to be here isn’t he? Just like Gwen, you lured him in on purpose. You’ve known from the beginning haven’t you?” he accused. 

It was Jack’s turn to swallow hard. He didn’t meet Ianto’s eyes and Ianto saw the guilt and shame return but it was different. This time, Jack looked as if he was walking an innocent man to the gallows. He could see Jack wrestling with a decision, looking back and forth between Mickey and Martha as if his former companions stood over him in judgement. With determination in his step, Jack walked up to Ianto.

“Jack, don’t. You can’t,” Martha warned. 

Jack ignored her and said, in a quiet but profound voice, “I’ve seen the human race become vast and magnificent and endless… and now I’ve had the honour of knowing some of the people who made that possible.” 

Ianto pressed his lips into a thin line. He was still pissed as hell at Jack but he said, “But if you know he’s going to-”

Jack interrupted him. “The future’s always being written, Yan. It’s being written right now. It _can_ change but I know there’s some things that shouldn’t… that _can’t._ ” He pointed back towards the Hub. “So you get that imprinter out of Tosh’s drawer. You and Mickey are going to figure out a way to hook it into the mainframe. You’re going to upload Tosh and I don’t care what you have to do to make it work but you _will_ make it work.” He didn’t take his eyes off Ianto. He narrowed his eyes and said, “That’s an order.”


	7. Chapter 7

Ianto finished setting out their late take away dinner in the boardroom. It was nearly ten at night. He’d ordered something for Henry even though he knew he wouldn’t eat. The only time he’d seen Henry leave Fish’s side was for calls of nature and Jack’s orders to stretch his legs. He nodded to Mickey and Martha, letting them know the food was ready and then walked into Jack’s office, straight backed and butler persona in full force. Jack was sitting behind his desk, giving Ianto a hopeful look. Just the sight of him enflamed Ianto’s anger. 

“Dinner is in the boardroom, _sir_ ,” he said, icily. He didn’t wait for an answer. He just turned on his heel and stepped out of the room. He slammed the door behind him with a satisfying bang. 

He was absolutely furious with Jack for what he’d done. He couldn’t even believe the possibility had entered Jack’s mind. Ianto considered his immortality to be a double edged sword. Certainly, it was more time with Jack, but it came at a horrible price. Jack had already told him, repeatedly, that he would never have wished it for him. So, why would Jack inflict a different sort of immortality on him, bringing him back as a clone over and over again? And given the nature of the memory imprint, it was entirely possibly that Ianto wouldn’t even know what was happening. Jack could’ve continued to resurrect his twenty first century self over and over and over again, ad infinitum, without Ianto even realising. The more he thought about it, the more angry and sick he became. 

He walked into the kitchen and began tidying even though it was already spotless. He was’t hungry and it gave him something to do. He leaned over the sink, tossing the sponge into it. Instead of scrubbing, he rinsed his hands and then splashed some water on his face. He closed his eyes, feeling it drip off his nose. He gave the cupboard beneath him a short, angry kick. 

“Ianto? Is something the matter? Are you all right?” asked Henry. 

Ianto stood up. He shut his eyes and groaned inwardly. He’d become so accustomed to sensing Henry’s presence fading in and out lately that he’d completely ignored his friend’s approach. He could hear Miranda’s voice in his head, chastising him for the sloppiness. 

Henry said, bemused, “I, too, hear Mao-Lin scolding us for our shared error.” 

Ianto ignored the attempt at levity and said, “I’m fine.” He turned back to the sink. The last thing he wanted to do was to bring up Jack’s infraction. He accidentally knocked the tea towel into the wet sink and muttered, “Cachu…” 

“You do not appear fine,” Henry said, patiently. 

The door to Jack’s office opened and Jack walked out. He gave Ianto and Henry a hurried look as he walked away not towards the boardroom and food but towards the east stairs. He was probably going to the computer mainframe room. He’d been checking on Mickey’s progress every ten or fifteen minutes. Ianto’s gaze could’ve frozen the whole Atlantic. 

“‘Speak of the devil and he doth appear.’ I take it Jack has done something objectionable?” Henry asked. He leaned against the counter and crossed his arms over his chest and his legs at the ankle. 

“It’s nothing,” Ianto said. He picked up the sodden tea towel and rang it out. He draped it over the faucet but then decided it probably needed washing. He tossed it under the sink into the small laundry basket he used for the kitchen items. 

“What is private, is private. Forgive me for prying. I was concerned by your distress,” Henry said, standing up. He gave Ianto a weak smile and turned to walk away. 

“You’re not prying, Henry,” Ianto said, feeling badly. He sighed and turned to Henry. “Jack’s just… being Jack. I’m sorry. I might be cross with him but right now but at least I have him. Fish… I’m sorry.” 

“My troubles do not diminish the weight of yours,” Henry said, frowning a bit. He looked over his shoulder and Ianto saw the suppressed grief. “Perhaps they will provide me with a distraction from my own.” He took a step towards Ianto and said, “Does this have to do with what Mickey is so hastily assembling and the item you look at with such loathing?” 

“Astute,” Ianto muttered.

“I’m an artist. Observation is a skill of my trade,” Henry replied. He shifted and cleared his throat, then continued, “I truly do not wish to pry, Ianto, nor have you reveal something which I may not be privy to.” 

“That’s not it, Henry. None of us want to worry you any more than you already are,” Ianto said. 

“I assure you, that is not possible,” Henry said, with a wry quirk to his mouth. 

Ianto let out a small, stifled laugh and then turned, leaning against the worktop. “Does Fish ever talk about his predecessor?” 

“Ms. Sato?” Henry said. The change of subject confused him. “On occasion, only to praise her genius. I know she was killed in the course of her duties.” Henry let out a small sigh. “I’m certain her expertise is precisely what one would require in a situation such as this.” 

Henry’s sixteenth century mind had unknowingly leapt in the correct direction. Ianto looked at his feet and said, “That ‘item’? It’s from the future.” 

“I had surmised.” 

“It’s used in human cloning.” 

Disapproval creased Henry’s face and Ianto continued, “In the future, they use it to store a person’s consciousness so it can be uploaded into a cloned body.” 

Immediately, Henry’s disapproval turned into disgust and anger. “If it is Jack’s intent to use this device on Joe-”

“No,” Ianto immediately interrupted. “Before she died, Tosh was fiddling with it, trying to figure out how it works. She accidentally scanned herself with it. We’re uploading her consciousness into the mainframe. Mickey’s trying to rig an interface between it and our computers and modify the mainframe so that it can handle the load. We’re hoping Tosh can help us to help Fish.” 

Henry tried to absorb what Ianto had just told him. He opened his mouth and then shut it again, more than once. 

“I know it feels like a moral grey zone, but it’s all we can think of,” Ianto said, shaking his head. He sighed and added, “Jack knew what the device was because… because…” 

“He has used it before,” Henry supplied, guessing the source of Ianto’s anger. He stood there for a long time, a pensive expression on his face. Minutes had ticked by when he finally said, “I do not mean to diminish your feelings but you are still young, my friend. When one becomes as long lived as I or Mao-Lin… or Jack… when one truly begins to understand the frailty and brevity of mortal life because one has watched it crumble across the years… the temptation to keep those we love with us beyond their lifespan - beyond the natural order - becomes even more difficult. Such is the nature of love, a force that can drive even the most sane of us to irrationality. Jack has stepped into an area of questionable morality and, given the level of your animosity, I assume he has done so without your permission.” 

Ianto nodded. 

“I understand your anger. We hold our own uniqueness as something sacred. Each of us is an irreplaceable individual. A clone - a copy of a human being, a unique soul - is abhorrent to many not because humanity has sought to play God but for the same reasons I believe you find it abhorrent - that it robs us of that uniqueness. It fades our individuality, that which makes us special.” Henry paused and crossed his arms over his chest. It looked more like he was hugging himself rather than putting up a defensive posture. He spoke sadly, “My first love is long dead, sleeping beneath the earth forever. When he died, I did not wish that he was still with me… I wished that I could slumber beside him. It was shortly after I had buried my Matthew that I exacted a promise from our teacher.” 

Ianto winced as he assumed what that promise was.

“I see from your reaction that you understand the particulars of that promise,” Henry said, simply. 

“I’m sorry, Henry-”

“I know you do not judge me, my friend,” Henry said, waving off Ianto’s apology. “Matthew and I had forty joyful years together. It is a joy I thought to never have again. Such is the nature of grief, another force which can lead us astray.” He shifted, looking down at his feet. “Now that God has brought Joe into my life, I have that joy again. But with that joy returns the ever present fear. I fear the time when Joe will no longer be a part of my life. Some would say that that fear is irrational, that it is possible a challenger will remove me from the Game before Joe succumbs to the dangers of his job or the passage of time. Still, I am afraid. Such is the nature of fear, another irrational force that pulls us about without rhyme or reason.” 

He stepped over to Ianto and put a hand on his arm. “Torchwood has opened my eyes to many possibilities, possibilities I would have thought existed only within the realm of fiction. The device that affronts you so would tempt me as well, my friend. Perhaps not as much as Jack, who is far more accustomed to such technology but who is also more versed in what will be invented in the next few thousand years. Would infection not frustrate you to distraction were you thrown back in time, knowing a simple antibiotic could be its cure? You are entitled to your anger, but I believe you are more enraged by Jack’s presumption rather than his actions - actions that were motivated by fear, grief and, most importantly, love.” 

Ianto took a deep breath and then let out it slowly. He saw Jack walking up from the east stairs. Ianto pushed off the worktop and walked past Henry, clapping him on the shoulder as he went. “Thanks, Henry.” 

“Anytime, lad,” Henry said, with a fatherly smile. He cleared his throat and said, “I never thanked you, my friend, for bringing Joe into my life.” 

Ianto looked surprised. “I don’t think I had anything to do with it.” 

“Joe tells the story quite differently,” Henry said and then turned and walked away. 

Ianto walked over to Jack’s office and bellowed across the Hub, “Jack! Your office!” 

How much Jack’s cheeks paled shouldn’t have satisfied Ianto as much as it did. With his head down, looking thoroughly chastised, Jack walked across the Hub towards his office. He stepped through the door and Ianto closed it behind him. Jack turned around looking sheepish. He looked almost like he was going to say something but decided against it. 

 _First thing’s first…_ Ianto cleared his throat and walked over to Jack. He said, “I’m sorry. No matter what you did, there’s no excuse for my striking you. Ever.” 

“No there isn’t,” Jack replied. Ianto had struck him before but that had been long before their relationship. They’d been rough with each other in the past but never violent. 

Ianto stepped back. “I know I’m not forgiven yet.” 

“Neither am I,” Jack said with a shake of his head. “And neither of us expect to be for a long time.” 

Ianto sat down on the sofa and asked, “Would you have gone through with it?” 

Jack shook his head. “No.” 

“Then why do it, Jack?”

Jack was about to sit down next to him on the sofa but thought better of it. He picked up the chair in front of his desk and turned it to face his husband.  

“When it fell through, I couldn’t believe it. They’re so illegal in my time that the only ones you can find are sold on the black market and held together with tape.” He leaned forward and scrubbed his face with his hands. He rested his elbows on his knees. “Faulty tech like that… let’s say the results were less than ideal. Most of the time, instead of your loved one, you end up with something else - a shadow of what they were, barely able to remember their own name or vegetative. And that’s if you were lucky. If you were unlucky? They ended up incoherent or insane.” 

“Then why do it? Why are we bothering to bring back Tosh if it’s not going to work?” Ianto asked, waving at the main Hub. 

“This device isn’t black market, Yan. People would try to travel back in time for these devices all the time. They were under Time Agency jurisdiction. I recognise it. It’s an original. It’ll work,” Jack insisted. “We just need to take precautions in case the transfer goes wrong.” 

Ianto sat there for a few minutes. He ran his palms on his trouser legs, shifting his feet. “You still didn’t answer my question. If you weren’t going to go through with it, why do it?” 

Jack leaned back in his chair, shifting a bit. “I saw it on the grass. It was just laying there, perfect as the day it was made.” Jack’s voice roughened and became unsteady. He sniffled hard. “That year I was away, I realised how bad I was to you. I took you for granted. I didn’t appreciate you enough. I loved you and I was too pigheaded to realise it.”  

Ianto was about to stop Jack’s emotional speech because he’d heard it before but Jack didn’t give him a chance. “You’re special Ianto. You were never my part time shag. I came back for you. That night, before Tommy, I could tell you’d finally forgiven me. You’d never stayed before.” Jack’s eyes looked wet and he let out a sad smile at the memory. “You were asleep and… I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. The only thing I could think about was that one day, I was going to lose you. You’d be in a drawer and all your suits would be in storage… your stopwatch…” 

Jack wiped at his eyes, his voice unsteady. “And I couldn’t exist in a universe that didn’t have you in it. I ran down into the archive for the imprinter and I used it on you. I just wanted some part of you… some piece… to be somewhere… even if it was only as an image on some tech…” 

Of all the explanations, Ianto hadn’t expected that. He got off the couch and knelt down. He took Jack’s hands and said, “I understand why you did it.”

“I’m sorry, Ianto. I’m so sorry.” He squeezed Ianto’s hands. “I know why you did it too.” 

Ianto sat back down on the sofa. “Owen. It can’t happen again, Jack. One day… you’re going to have to let us go. All of us.” _Even me._

“With Owen… I was desperate. I didn’t want it to happen again. I didn’t want to lose all of you one by one… be the last man standing. The one left to bear witness…” 

“I’ve spent some time in immortal shoes now. I should have understood better. After Cameron…” He shook his head. “I wondered when I’d know more people inside the morgue than outside of it. I understand why you brought back Owen.” 

Jack sighed. “I was so selfish and Owen paid the price. I’d never do that again, Yan.” 

“I know that, cariad. I’m sorry.” 

Jack pulled him into a hug. They were both still upset and angry, at themselves and each other. They’d both made mistakes - big mistakes - but they would get through this. All they needed was time and these days they had plenty.


	8. Chapter 8

Ianto stopped in the kitchen to pour Mickey a mug of coffee and bring him something to eat. He heard a sharp cry of pain and then muttered curses as he approached the mainframe room. He picked up his pace and said, “Mickey? You all right?” 

All he saw were Mickey’s legs jutting out from behind a gigantic rack of computer equipment. He called out, “Yeah, I’m fine. Cut myself something wicked.” 

He sat up and Ianto saw the blood on his hand and winced. “You want Martha to come look at that?” 

“Nah, mate, it’s not that deep,” he said, peering at it. “Some of these edges are fucking sharp.” 

Ianto set his tray down on the small table and reached for the small first aid kit. “You should clean it out at least.” 

The mainframe room was a bit of a mess. Fish had been mucking around in here for a while. He may have always said he was a chemist first and an engineer second, but he constantly tinkered with the mainframe trying to improve it. Ianto often helped, acting as an extra set of hands. Mickey had largely taken on that role since he’d come to lend a hand and Fish had remarked just last week about how much he’d learned from the Londoner. Ianto laid his hand on a computer that Fish had installed recently. 

As he handed Mickey the antiseptic, he said, “I suppose we’re lucky Fish has already done a lot of upgrading for the user interface.” 

“There’s a big difference between making the mainframe’s interface more personable and uploading someone’s entire consciousness,” Mickey said. He dabbed at the cut on his hand, jerking his elbow at the computers. “We need to increase processing power and storage capacity way beyond what Fish’s already done.”

“Can I help you with anything? Do you have everything you need?” 

“We’re going to have to do a lot of ordering,” Mickey said. He took a few plasters from Ianto, opening them and covering the cut. To his annoyance, he was bleeding through them. The cut taken care of, he reached for his next priority - his coffee - and gulping it down. He picked up a list of items off one of the computers, leaving a smear of blood on the paper. “Shit, sorry.” 

“Don’t worry about it,” Ianto said, ignoring the blood. 

Mickey chuckled. “Not like you’ll catch anything.” 

“Why you got something contagious?” Ianto asked with a wink. 

“Eh, don’t tell the wife,” he said, smiling. 

Ianto looked over the list as Mickey removed the soaked plasters and replaced them. 

“It’ll take at least a day to get all this,” Ianto said, taking out his PDA. 

“Going to be pricey,” said Mickey over his mug. 

Ianto’s knowledge of computer technology had improved a great deal since he’d started working for Torchwood but he hadn’t heard of half of these things. He replied, “The cost doesn’t matter. We’re not UNIT. We have more leeway with spending.” 

Despite Jack’s penchant for the lavish, he was quite frugal with the Torchwood budget. Their emergencies fund had done nothing but grow since the millennium and Ianto decided this was certainly a time to use it. He tapped the paper. “Is this everything?” 

“Well if the cost doesn’t matter…” Mickey took the paper back and started to write down more items. “Most of this is for storage. Since Jack wants her completely firewalled from the rest of the system, I need as much as I can get.” 

Ianto leaned over his shoulder, reading as he wrote. “There are some storage devices and computers in the archive.” 

“I’d rather not pilfer too much. Alien tech and stuff from the future is all fine and good but if it breaks, we’ve no way to fix it. Now, the link between our system and the imprinter’s a different story.”

“I thought that was what you did at UNIT,” Ianto said, tapping at his PDA. 

“It is. I’m going to need every piece of technology from the imprinter’s time period,” Mickey replied. He started counting off points on his fingers. Ianto could tell he was feeling the pressure. “The human brain can store a lot. Even with all the upgrades, the upload is probably going to take day or two.” 

“A day or two?!” Ianto said with wide eyes. 

“I won’t know how long exactly until I get an idea of what’s in the archive.” Mickey picked up the loupe and turned it in his hands. “If we have things from this thing’s era, it’ll help a lot. If all I could use was stuff off a twenty first century shelf? The transfer may take three or four days, maybe longer.” He held the loupe up and looked at it. “This baby? It’s got data compression we haven’t even dreamed of yet.”

Ianto put the list down once he’d stored it into his PDA. He pushed the paper further onto the table. “So we’re looking at two days, minimally. This’ll take a good day to process and ship.” 

“I’ll work as fast as I can down here. Thanks for the food and drink,” Mickey said. He gulped the last of his coffee. He picked up half of the sandwich Ianto had brought him, finishing it in a few bites. He turned back to his work. Mickey looked tired. His face was a bit grey and his eyes were blood shot. 

“You should try and have a kip,” Ianto said, concerned. 

He shook his head and turned back to his work. “Jack said this was important.” While he sorted through a large bundle of cables, he asked, cautiously, “What do you think Fish does?” 

“Pardon?” Ianto asked. He looked up. His attention had been on clearing away the tray. 

“What do you think Jack meant when he said-”

“Stop, Mickey,” Ianto said, holding up his hand. “You travelled with the Doctor. You should know better.” 

“Must be something big, if it found its way into Jack’s history books,” Mickey said, ignoring Ianto’s warning. 

“I’m trying not to think about it. Jack says it’s dangerous, trying to connect too many dots and figure out what parts of our present lead to the future,” Ianto said. 

“You could always tell when the TARDIS had landed us at one of those big moments,” Mickey said, plugging in cables as he sorted them. “The Doctor, he’d get this look of awe on his face. Jack had that same look when he was talking about Fish.” Anxiousness flashed across Mickey’s face and he lowered the cables in his hands. He confessed, “I hope this works, Ianto, because I’m all out of ideas. That time dilation lego thing? It’s really got me stumped. I don’t even know how it’s powering itself. I could stare at it all day for the rest of my life and not sort it.” 

“You’re not in this alone, mate. We’ll find a way,” Ianto said. “Does UNIT have anything in the Black Archive we could use?” 

Mickey shook his head. “Nah. Nothing that would help here.”

Suddenly, an idea came to Ianto. UNIT’s Black Archive wasn’t the only repository of alien technology on the planet. “Be right back.” 

He abruptly left the room, heading back to the main Hub. He put his comm unit into his ear and walked straight down the north stairs. He turned right at the t-junction and stepped into Miranda’s rooms for privacy.

They smelled a bit musty, having been unused for a few months. Ianto shut the door behind him and took out his mobile. He dialed a number from memory and got the answer phone. Swearing, he dialed a different number. The call was answered and all Ianto heard was classical music. It sounded as if he was on hold but he knew better. 

“Jones, Ianto. Torchwood authorization echo, triple one, charlie eight zero five,” he said crisply over the music. 

The music changed and Ianto couldn’t help but bark out a laugh. It was the theme song from the Men in Black movie. Ianto had always thought MiB had taken themselves way too seriously. It seems Fish’s time with them had given them a sense of humour. It was a far cry from the cliche code phrases of their past. It was a good change. 

“Mr. Jones, my apologies for the hold. This is Agent Levine,” a young male voice said suddenly. 

Ianto knew all of MiB’s protocols and procedures. Along with the rest of Torchwood, he’d help create them. He knew exactly what to say to get what he needed. “Agent Levine, this is a level two situation. I repeat, this is a level two situation. I need to speak with Director Donovan immediately. He’s not answering his mobile.” 

“The Director’s is at his grandson’s first birthday party. He’s not in the office,” he replied. “I’ve sent the relevant code to the Director’s cell phone. If you call again, he’ll answer.” 

“Thank you, Agent Levine,” Ianto said and, not intending to be rude, he immediately rang off. He was in a rush. He dialed Donovan’s number and waited. It rang once and then twice. 

When Donovan answered, the first sounds Ianto heard were laughing children and music. The next sounds were the missing r’s of Donovan’s thick Boston accent. 

“Ianto, what’s wrong? Joe hasn’t gotten drunk and called off the wedding has he? I’ve already got my plane ticket,” he said, trying to joke. More seriously, he asked, “Is the world ending?” 

“The world’s always ending,” he replied, automatically. 

“Bloody Torchwood,” Donovan said, playfully. “How can I help?” 

It took Ianto a few minutes to explain Fish’s situation. When he was finished, Donovan said, without hesitation, “Whatever Torchwood needs, Ianto. Anything. Area 51 will be completely at your disposal. I can have my best scientists in Wales by morning.” 

“Thanks, Ethan, but what I really need is a complete image inventory of everything Area 51 has.” 

“That’s gonna be a very short list,” Donovan said. “When do you need it?” 

“Immediately,” Ianto said, trying to convey the urgency with his voice. 

“Give me a few minutes. I’ll call you back,” Donovan said. He rang off and Ianto waited. 

After nearly a half hour, Ianto started to fidget. He’d resisted the urge to pace across Miranda’s lounge but was shifting his weight from one foot to the other. He nearly rang Donovan back himself but just as he was about to, his mobile rang. “Ethan?” 

“Yeah, sorry that took so long. I think Area 51 needs a retraining exercise on high level situations,” Donovan said. He sounded a bit exasperated. “My head of R&D is getting that list to you. It should be in your e-mail in the next half hour. If it isn’t, there’s going to be hell to pay. And by ‘hell to pay’ I mean I’ll have a new head of R&D.” 

“Thanks, Ethan. I appreciate the expedience,” Ianto said. “I’m sorry I’m spoiling your day with this.” 

“You’re not. I needed a break from the screaming children. My son-in-law comes from a big family.” Even though Donovan had plans to come out for the wedding, he began to make polite inquiries about Fish and Henry. Ianto thought about stopping him, but he didn’t have anything else to do. His PDA had already automatically ordered the items on Mickey’s list. Until he got the list from Area 51, he was in a holding pattern. So, he patiently spoke to Donovan as he asked about Gwen and Rhys, telling him to pass on his condolences. He’d kept in touch with everyone after his time training with them, though as Donovan’s family life had grown, he’d spoken to them all less and less. He was genuinely concerned and wanted to know how all his friends were doing but Ianto could tell that he was winding up to his real question. It was a question he had no idea how to answer. 

“How’s Miranda?” 

“She’s great.” Ianto had answered a little too quickly and mechanically. He’d looked around at the sheet covered furniture as he’d done it. 

“You’re lying, and when all this has cooled off, I’d really like to know why,” Donovan said, concerned. “What’s-his-name hasn’t gone and done something stupid has he?” 

That comment caught Ianto off guard. He hadn’t ever mentioned John Hart to Donovan in this or any other conversation. He had no idea what to say, if anything. 

“Joe let that cat out of the bag a while ago,” Donovan supplied. He said, genuinely, “I’m happy for her, Ianto.” He cleared his throat and said, “If that son of a bitch has done something stupid…” 

He wondered how much Donovan knew. Did he know about Hart’s origins? His sudden disappearance? In the end, Ianto decided not to say anything. 

“I don’t know how she is. She went off on holiday a few months ago.” 

Ianto couldn’t see it but Donovan winced. His silence and evasion was all confirmation Donovan needed that Miranda’s new boyfriend had, in fact, done something stupid. 

“And you haven’t heard from her?” he asked, surprised. “She’s missing Henry and Joe’s wedding?” 

“Not a word. They didn’t want to push the wedding off to wait for her. Henry hasn’t said but I get the feeling he knows she won’t be coming back any time soon. She doesn’t even know about Gwen and Rhys.” Ianto let his eyes wander around the room, settling on the mobile telephone. He’d accepted Miranda’s need for a break and even understood it. The fact that her mobile was sitting on that counter was not something he could accept nor understand. He stared at it, continually expecting it to ring. “We’ve no way to get in touch with her. She left her mobile.” 

“She what!? That woman,” Donovan growled a bit. It was a curse Ianto had often heard Jack utter. 

Even though Ianto’s angry disappointment with Miranda had been steadily deepening, he was still defensive of his friend and teacher. 

“Oi!” 

As always when he got a cross, Donovan’s accent thickened. “Look, Ianto, I know she’s your teacher and your friend but she can be a real piece of work. This ain’t about what went down between me and her. I got nothing wrong with being nothing but somebody’s good time. You people treated her like family - like real family - and to go off and leave you with no way to get in touch with her? That’s damn cold and selfish.” Donovan let out a sigh that was impatient and frustrated. “You want me to look into it? See if I can dig something up?” 

At first, Ianto was going to refuse, but Donovan had hit the nail on the head. “Yeah, that’d be great, Ethan, thanks.” He looked around Miranda’s lounge at the sheet covered furniture. Ianto started to wonder if he did manage to get a message to her, if she’d come back or not. He remembered what Henry had told her a while ago about Miranda’s excursions into solitude. “She may’ve gone off the grid.” 

“There’s no such thing,” replied Donovan. “Even if people vanish, it leaves signs. I’ll look for the breadcrumbs and get back to you. You’ll keep me updated about Joe?” 

“Of course. Enjoy the rest of your party.” 

“I will. I’ll send you pictures of my grandson covered in cake,” Donovan replied. The pause between was full of awkward uncertainty. With false confidence, he said, “I’ll see you at the wedding next week.”

Ianto replied with the same, “Yeah, next week.” 

He rang off and tried not to let the sinking feeling creep over him as he left Miranda’s lounge. He stopped at his workstation to read the e-mail from Area 51. With disappointment, the list was a dead end. As Donovan had said, the list was extremely short. Most of the items were from the old Roswell crash. The other items, Ianto was able to identify with his eidetic memory. Nothing was futuristic. Oh, it was all alien, no doubt about that, but all of it was time current. Not unexpected since America only collected what fell to Earth within their borders. Grateful for their speed and feeling badly about interrupting Donovan at such an important family event, Ianto had sent that information on to MiB even though Jack would have disapproved. 

Ianto left the main Hub to help Mickey in any way he could. He looked at Fish with an uncomfortable feeling in his belly as he walked past him. Despite the fact that he’d been slowed to less than a snail’s pace for nearly three days, he’d experienced less than half a minute. Last night, he’d begun showing signs that he knew something was wrong. His expression was a mixture of concern, confusion and fear. He appeared to be shouting into the Hub. 

He didn’t even bother telling Mickey he’d contacted the Americans. It’d gone no where so there was no point. They’d make do with what they had. He had managed to pull several items from the archive that were from the imprinter’s time period and Mickey had worked nonstop on a link between it and their mainframe. Ianto also worked nonstop on installing all the mainframe upgrades once the equipment arrived late that afternoon. They’d eaten as they’d worked and Ianto had only stopped to change out of his suit and into jeans and a t-shirt so he could work more efficiently. Now it was very late. In fact, Ianto thought it was probably near dawn.

Mickey and Ianto finished connecting the last cable, installing the last cooling fan and turning on the power. Ianto thought there should’ve been something more to it than pressing a button but that was all it took to begin downloading everything that had been Toshiko Sato into the hard drive array. Ianto’d clapped Mickey on the shoulder and wished him a good rest as the exhausted Londoner had dragged himself, on heavy feet, to the staterooms to collapse. 

Ianto stood there for a long time, staring at the device. He reached out to touch the imprinter but curled back his fingers and went in search of his husband. When he walked into the main Hub, it was in night mode. He was surprised at how tidy it was since he hadn’t been cleaning at all. Jack must have taken care of all his evening chores. He got a glass of water from the kitchen and then walked towards Jack’s office. With the glass in hand, he stepped to the ladder and was about to climb down when a voice said, “You and Mickey taking a break?” 

He was overtired and hadn’t seen his husband sitting in the dark. It startled him and he nearly dropped the glass. “Jack!” 

“Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you,” he replied. He reached forward, turning on one of his desk lamps. 

“You haven’t slept have you?” 

“I tried.” Jack shook his head, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You should catch a few hours.” 

“I’m going to,” he replied, not even trying to argue. “We’re done. The upload’s started.” 

Jack dropped his arm, hard, onto the desk. “Did Mickey install the failsafe like I asked?” 

Ianto nodded. “There’s a small explosive under the hard drive array. It’s enough to destroy the hard drives and I don’t think it’ll cause structural damage. He’s also put in that EMP we used from the nanopaths. It’ll fire first and then the explosives will detonate.” 

“When Mickey wakes up, I want him to disconnect us. I want all outside connectivity, wired and wireless, completely severed,” Jack said, rubbing at his eyes. 

“Do you think it’ll be that bad? The array is already firewalled.” 

“Think about it from her point of view, Ianto,” Jack said, looking out over the Hub through his office window. “She’s not going to understand what’s happened. From what Mickey said, he can keep her isolated but he had to let her have access to the mainframe to preserve communication and functionality. She’ll have total control over everything. I’m not just talking about the lights and the doors. She could blow the self destruct charges. She could evacuate all the air… and that’s just if everything goes right. If we lose things in the transfer, she could end up insane or incoherent…” He let out a long, slow, sigh. 

Ianto walked around Jack’s desk and leaned against it. “Tosh was my best friend, Jack. I don’t think I’ve ever met a kinder, more gentler soul and I don’t think I ever will. She should rest in peace.”

“I wouldn’t be doing this if it wasn’t important or if I thought there was another way. I can tell Mickey’s stumped even if he doesn’t want to come out and say it to me,” Jack said. He let out a deep sigh. “I loved her, too.” 

“I trust you,” Ianto said, gently. He put his hand on Jack’s and pulled him up out of his chair. He tugged him into his arms and said, “I wasn’t accusing you of anything, cariad.” 

Jack nodded and buried his face in Ianto’s shoulder. They stayed like that for a few minutes. Unsaid words passed between them. The crack formed from Jack’s deception and Ianto’s violent outburst was mending itself. Jack stood up. After brushing his fingertips down Ianto’s cheek, he stepped back and said, “Mickey’s best guess on the upload time?” 

“Twenty four to thirty hours. He couldn’t give a more precise estimate. He also reckons we’ll only have one shot at it. If it doesn’t work this time, we won’t be able to try again,” Ianto said, standing. As he walked towards the bunker, he unbuckled his belt and then pulled his t-shirt off, up over his head. 

Jack sat down in his desk chair and looked up at him. After giving Ianto’s well muscled back an appreciative once over, he cleared his throat and said, “Once the clock hits twenty three hours, I want the Hub cleared of everyone but you and put into a silent lockdown.” 

Ianto turned, his shirt in his hands. “Me? Why me?” 

“Like you said, Tosh was your best friend. You have this way about you, Yan. You’re the right person to explain this to her.”


	9. Chapter 9

Exactly twenty three hours after they’d started the upload, Ianto was alone in the Hub, sealed off from the outside world. He felt ridiculous just sitting there on the sofa in Jack’s office. Jack had rerouted all the rift alerts to his wrist strap. The team had taken the SUV and anything they thought they would need out in the field. They’d be using Ianto’s old flat as their base of operations. Ianto tried not to think of the three of them handling all the rift alerts alone. He was slouched down, feeling rather bored for once in his life. He wished he could put on some music. The silence was getting to him. He’d been sitting there for hours. 

He was about to get up and find a book or a magazine when, suddenly, the entire Hub went dark. It wasn’t the usual night mode. Every light in the Hub, including the emergency lighting, had turned off. Ianto couldn’t see his hand in front of his face. He stood up and reached into his pocket for his torch. He was going to head for the electrical cupboard but something felt wrong. The Hub was Ianto’s home. He knew how it should look, feel, smell and sound. A shiver went up his neck and he distinctly felt like he was being watched. He slipped the torch back into his pocket, concentrating on the darkness. The first change he noticed was the fans that circulated the air. They were speeding up and slowing down at a fairly regular interval… like someone breathing. 

He took out his stopwatch and clicked the button. The dark didn’t bother him. Ianto could move around the entire Hub with his eyes shut. He rolled his sleeves back down and buttoned them. He put his suit jacket back on and straightened his tie. Since it was dark, he couldn’t see his stopwatch to tell how long he’d been standing there. It had been more of a comforting gesture than anything else. The lights flickered on and then immediately went off again, startling him a bit. Ianto swallowed and then took a deep breath to calm his nerves. The lights flickered again and he stepped to the middle of the room. It wasn’t long before the flickering sped up and the lights came on and stayed that way. Ianto blinked at the brightness and looked around. The camera lights were all still off. 

“Tosh?” he called out. 

There was no response. The fans were still speeding up and then slowing down. The lights flickered off but only for a second.  

“Tosh?” 

“Ianto?” The lights in the Hub began to flicker, strobe-like. He turned as the cogwheel door opened and the invisible lift began to descend. He heard the sound of the doors all over the Hub bolting and unbolting themselves. The proximity alarms were silent. 

“Ianto?! I… I… I can’t… I can’t move!” 

“Tosh, it’s okay.” 

“Oh God, Ianto… I can’t see… I can’t see! I… I can’t move! OH MY GOD!” 

She started to scream. Tosh’s fear and despair had caused the speakers in the Hub to amplify the sound a thousand fold. Ianto wanted to clap his hands over his ears at the deafening noise. He shouted back at her, “Tosh! Tosh, calm down! You’re fine!” 

 _“OH MY GOD! I CAN’T SEE! I CAN’T MOVE!”_  

She started to scream in between the sobs. Ianto saw the water cycling over the water tower had begun to rush, churning and bubbling as the pump began to work harder. 

“TOSHIKO!” Ianto barked. “You’re going to be okay!” 

She didn’t answer him. He stood there, helpless, while she cried and screamed. The effects of the emotional outburst were all around him. The lights in the Hub flickered wildly, a few of the bulbs bursting. The fans cranked up to full speed, would suddenly stop and then blast again. After nearly a half hour, the effects slowed and Tosh asked, “What… happened… how…?” 

“What’s the last thing you remember?” he asked. His ears were still ringing. He had no idea what to say to her. He couldn’t think of how to possibly begin. He probably should have thought about what to say to her while he was waiting to see if their attempt had been successful. _Hindsight…_

“I was tinkering with some piece of tech.” 

He knew that Tosh had scanned herself with this device but he wasn’t quite sure when since she’d done it at home. He needed to figure out where the gap began. “What was the last case we worked?” 

“Jonah Bevin,” she said, sadly. 

“What was the piece of tech you were working on? What did it do?” 

“It was a neural scanner,” she replied. “I was trying to figure out how to work the readout, scanning myself with it over and over again. I thought Owen could use it.” 

“You’re right, Tosh. It was a neural scanner. It was used for memory and personality imprinting,” Ianto said, slowly. 

“What? How do you know that?” 

He took a deep breath. At that moment, Ianto hated Jack for having him be the one to do this. “Because right now… you’re the imprint we uploaded into the mainframe.” 

_“WHAT?”_

A few more bulbs blew out in the main Hub area and Ianto winced at the volume. There’d been a bit of feedback in the speakers as well. He ducked as the lights brightly flared above him. 

“Tosh, calm down. I want you to concentrate for me, okay? I need you to think about the CCTV system, about what you used to do to access the security cameras inside the Hub.” 

Ianto flicked his gaze up to the camera in the corner of Jack’s office. 

“Tosh… please…” 

He watched the camera carefully. After a minute the light turned on. 

“Tosh, slowly, access just the one camera in Jack’s office,” Ianto said. His voice was steady and calm. He shifted to stand in the middle of the camera’s view then cleared his throat into his fist. “Better?” 

“Oh, God, it’s true…” she said, her voice trembling. 

He could feel the reality of what they’d done to her crashing over her like an avalanche, smothering her spirit. The guilt rose up in him. He felt terribly. He’d ripped her from her final rest, her peace. 

In a meek voice, she asked, “Why? Why have you done this to me?” 

Ianto’s answer was simple and desperate all at once. “Because we need you.” 

Time was limited, so Ianto condensed seven years into a very short speech. He told her about how Jack had had to hire new staff… and then in a quiet voice, he told her about Owen. That was actually harder than telling her she was uploaded into the mainframe. When she’d quieted, he told her about Fish and then tried to explain how Fish had gotten into his current situation. 

“You’re the only person who’s ever figured out a time lock properly,” he explained. “Martha says he’s immune suppressed because he’s moving so slow. We need to get him back to normal and we need to do it before he gets sick.” 

“He’s not in a time lock,” she replied. 

“Yes, time dilation, I know. None of us can figure out the device that did this to him,” he replied. “We can’t bring in another team and risk exposing him to more disease.” 

“One second for every three hours, twenty eight minutes and seventeen seconds. What? I can see it on the cameras,” she said, smoothly. “He’s cute.” 

Ianto rolled his eyes. He was only supposed to let the others back into the Hub if he deemed Tosh to be her old self and sane. So far, everything seemed normal. “Fish’s good looks aside-”

“I can see the device. You’ll have to set up a camera for me, something handheld so I can get in close and something with a better view of the worktable. Why the bloody hell did he move it over there for? It won’t be _level_ over there!” 

“Fish’s poor furniture placement aside-”

“Well? What are you waiting for, Ianto? It’s not like I’ve got hands and can do all this myself,” she said, exasperated. “Get a move on!”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, smiling. 

He left Jack’s office for the equipment storage room. He grabbed everything he needed. After putting everything down on Gwen’s desk, he shrugged out of his suit jacket, draping it over the chair. The next thing to go was his tie. He unbuttoned his shirt cuffs and rolled up the sleeves. He hastily disassembled Gwen’s computer so he could connect the cameras. Tosh, however, was feeling left out and bored just watching him. She tried making small talk while she waited. 

“So tell me more about what’s happened in the last seven years,” she said. 

Ianto shrugged, trying to concentrate on what he was doing. 

“How are you and Jack?” she asked. 

“We’re fine,” he replied. 

“Fine?” she said, annoyed. “That’s a wedding ring I see on your finger, Ianto Jones. That’s more than fine.” 

“Tosh, I’ll catch you up, I promise, but we are on a bit of a timetable here,” he said, waving at Fish and the computer. 

“Easy for you to say,” she muttered. “You already know what’s been going on.” 

“Did you not hear what I said about him being immune suppressd?” Ianto let out an impatient sigh. While he continued working, he relented. “I’m sorry, Tosh. What do you want to know?” 

“You can start with how you and Jack ended up married,” she said. 

“That… is something… of a long story…” Ianto said. He paused as he spoke, concentrating on hooking up the camera. 

“Are you happy?” Tosh asked, cautiously. 

He thought about it for a second, his mouth pulling itself into a smile all on its own. He put the camera down and a dreamy look came over his face. “Yes, yes I am.” 

“And Gwen?” she asked, again with a cautious tone. 

“She’s had a rough go of it lately,” Ianto answered. He resumed his work. 

Tosh picked up on his tone immediately. She asked, concerned, “What happened?” 

Ianto put the camera down, stopping his work entirely. He sat down, heavily, into Fish’s chair. This story deserved his full attention. He quietly told Tosh about Gwen and Rhys’s struggles. Even though Tosh listened on in silence, he heard the water pumps cycle faster more than a few times. 

“I wish I could help her,” she said, quietly. 

Slouching deeply in the chair, Ianto twisted a little. “We’ve all tried visiting a few times. Her and Rhys are concentrating on each other.” He scrubbed at his face in a very Jack-like way. “She thinks working here’s done something to her.” 

Tosh couldn’t help but think the same. Look at Suzie… and Owen… It had certainly done something to her. She was uploaded into the bloody mainframe! The rift manipulator equipment in the water tower emitted low level radiation. They were exposed to all manner of alien substances who’s effects couldn’t even begin to be imagined. Then there was the constant stress and physical strain of the job itself - the lack of sleep, the adrenaline, the poor diet. She muttered, “It’s not fair.” 

He knew she was talking about more than what was happening to Gwen and Rhys. He heard the fans change speed, almost like a sigh. He scrubbed at his face and stood up. He started attaching the camera to the moveable tripod and said, “No, it’s not.” 

After a few moments of awkward silence, Tosh asked, “So where’s everyone else?” 

Ianto decided to be honest. “We had to cobble something together to upload you. None of us were sure what the side effects would be. Jack wanted me to make sure it was safe before I let everybody back in. They’re operating remotely.” He connected the last cable and plugged in the camera. “Can you access the camera? Can you move it?” 

“No,” she replied. 

Ianto rechecked the connections. Finding nothing wrong and not without a little frustration, he sat down at the computer to begin troubleshooting. 

“Hang on,” she said and Ianto stopped what he was doing. “No, not that. Keep working on the camera. Why didn’t Jack stay behind? Why’d he have you do it, if he thought it was dangerous?” 

“He thought a friendlier face would be best,” Ianto said. “He didn’t want to risk the mortal members of the team.” 

“Oh, but he’s willing to risk his own husband. That’s rich!” Tosh said, annoyed. 

Ianto stopped typing and winced. He’d left out a huge piece of the past seven years. He hadn’t told Tosh about his immortality or the Game yet. He clicked and tapped away, trying to figure out why the computer wasn’t seeing the camera. Mostly, he was trying to figure out what the hell to say to Tosh. 

“You see… the thing is… Ummm…” 

“Immortality’s sexually transmitted after all?” she quipped. 

He couldn’t help but roll his eyes spectacularly. “My immortality’s not like Jack’s.” 

“Wait a minute. You’re telling me you _are_ immortal? Bloody hell, Ianto!” 

“Tosh…” 

“No, NO! You do not get to drop a giant bomb like that and back out of it!” she screeched. 

Ianto jumped as a window appeared on the screen with Tosh’s face. “Shit! Don’t do that!” 

“I was tired of watching you talk to the air.” 

“Can you warn me before you do something like that?” he said, shaking his head. It looked exactly like the user interface. She was wearing a pink jumper, sitting at her desk. She immediately yanked off the glasses that were on her face and slammed them onto the desk in front of her. “I want an explanation!” 

“Tosh, we really don’t have time…” he trailed off as he saw her fold her arms across her chest. He let out a frustrated huff and began to explain. He told her about his first death and the Game. 

“Why haven’t we heard about this Game thing before?” she asked. 

“Jack’s kept it under the table for a long time,” Ianto said. He resumed working on the camera. He’d found nothing wrong on the computer’s end so he assumed he must have made a mistake elsewhere. It was easily done with Tosh distracting him. He got up and began replacing some of the cables. “Torchwood found out about it once and it was a disaster. They captured one of us and experimented on him.” 

“And he’s known all along he’s not alone? That there are other immortals?” 

“We’re not like Jack,” Ianto insisted. He tapped his skull. “The lights go out for good if my head comes off.” 

“Did he know?” 

Ianto shook his head. “No, he didn’t. He wasn’t happy Mandy knew about it for as long as she did and didn’t say anything. I wasn’t either, come to think.” 

“Have you… ever…?” 

“Once,” he said. Suddenly Carl Brogen’s surprised face popped into his memory. He swallowed hard and continued working. “It was me or him, Tosh.” 

“So much has changed,” she muttered. 

Ianto’s head snapped up at the sound of the camera moving. “You have control of it!” 

“Huh, will you look at that!” she gasped. The previous subject completely forgotten. “Never seen anything like that before.” 

“Tosh? Put the camera’s feed up on the screen so I can see what you’re seeing,” he said. A few seconds later a window appeared. “Thanks. Oi? Think you could focus on the artefact and not Fish’s bum?” 

“Who’s Henry?” Tosh asked and Ianto saw the camera had shifted. Tosh was zooming in on the note taped to the table.

“His fiancé,” Ianto said. He started setting up the second camera. This one was a small fiber optic camera that could manoeuver in tight spaces. 

“He’s a member of the team too?” Tosh asked, confused. 

“Sort of. He’s an immortal of the Game and a former student of Mandy’s. He was attacked by an alien a few years ago so Jack and Mandy read him in,” Ianto explained. “He fills in sometimes. Goes out on field calls. He’s another immortal to help protect everyone.” 

He continued to work in silence. This camera was proving a bit trickier than the other one. While she waited, Tosh stretched her virtual ‘legs’ and when she did, she realised how connected she was. She couldn’t expand into the entire mainframe, but she had complete access to it. So while she waited, she began satisfying her own curiosity. She’d opened digitised reports and personnel files. 

“Things certainly are different around here,” she said, mostly to herself. 

Ianto was oblivious to what she was doing. Thinking she was speaking about the personnel changes, he said, “Fish is a good person.” 

She couldn’t help but wonder if these immortals had been around would she and Owen still be… She shook off the thought. It wouldn’t do to be second guessing the past. While Ianto continued to fiddle with the camera, Tosh expanded her snooping. She started taking a look around, accessing cameras all around the Hub. The place had looked mostly the same to her… until she’d come across the mainframe server room. That was when she saw the explosives beneath her hard drive array.


	10. Chapter 10

By the time the cameras were set up and working, Ianto was thoroughly convinced that Tosh was herself. She was acting a bit distracted and distant, but being told you were dead and now uploaded onto a computer system could have that effect on anyone. He let everyone back into the Hub so Mickey could take up working with Tosh. He was glad to hand over the job. The tech wasn’t his specialty. Setting up the cameras had been relatively straight forward but figuring out the time dilation device was something else entirely. Ianto also needed to keep himself available for the odd rift alert. The immortals on the team were trying to ensure that Martha never saw to one on her own. While Henry disliked leaving his fiancé’s side, he still assisted whenever required since pitching in allowed Mickey to work undisturbed without worrying his wife’s safety. 

Though the team had regained Tosh’s technical genius, her lack of a body hindered everything. She had to relay even the smallest instructions through Mickey. The only things she did have control over were the small cameras Ianto had set up. It was frustrating for both of them. A lot of people think that technology is mechanical. It should be a simple matter of circuitry and current but it wasn’t like that at all. There were many things that Tosh had done simply by feel or instinct and while she was working through Mickey Smith, that aspect was gone. The art of her work was something that she couldn’t communicate. Mickey was talented. He had a gift for the technological translation that had been required to download her consciousness off of the imprinter but figuring out the time dilation device was a different skill set. If Tosh had had a head, she would be banging it against the desk. By the end of the day both Mickey and Toshiko were extremely frustrated. 

“NO! NO! STOP! STOP!” she shouted, loudly. She’d raised the speakers to an ear splitting volume and Henry jumped. The piercing shrill of feedback echoed through the Hub. “You can’t do that! You could damage something! You could damage something!” 

Mickey dropped the voltage meter probe onto the desk and then shoved the screwdriver to his left off the table in a fit of anger. “A lot of the guts are behind this plate. I have to remove it!” 

“Use the fiber optic camera first!” she shouted. 

“Where? Where am I going to fit it? The plate is solid!” Mickey said, waving at the device. 

Henry stood up and put his hand on Mickey’s shoulder. “Mickey, you have been pushing yourself a great deal. Perhaps an early night? A good night’s rest and you can look at it with fresh eyes in the morning.” 

“Henry, I appreciate-”

“I think that’s a great idea,” Jack called out from his office. Henry and Mickey looked up. They hadn’t realised the Captain had been watching them. “Mickey? Go home to Martha. Come in late tomorrow. And by late I mean I don’t want to see you before eleven.” 

“Jack-”

“No arguments. Get out of here,” Jack repeated. 

Mickey collected his things and as he walked towards the garage, he let out a frustrated sigh and rolled his eyes. 

“I saw that!!” Tosh snapped at his retreating back. 

Jack stood there and flicked his gaze upwards at one of the cameras. He looked at Henry and said, “Henry? Why don’t you go stretch your legs?” 

For a minute it looked like the Englishman was going to object, but he picked up his coat and sword and took the invisible lift up to the Plass. Jack waited for the dull sound of the paving stone sliding into place before he spoke. 

“Tosh, I know you’re frustrated but you gotta ease up on Mickey,” he said, gently. 

“If I could just get my hands on that thing, I would’ve had it figured out by now!” she lamented. 

He said, sharply, “Well, you can’t. That’s not the way things are for you now. So suck it up and do your job.” 

Ianto came up from the east stairs with an awkward look on his face. He cleared his throat. Jack ignored him and said, into the Hub, “Make do with what you have. I can’t tell you to get some sleep but you figure out a way to take a step back and you take it.” 

With that, he whirled away into his office. Ianto wasn’t surprised when he saw him with his coat on. Jack was headed towards the roof. Ianto heard the water tower pumps cycling faster. 

“Tosh? You all right?” he asked. 

“Yeah, fine… fine,” she said. She sighed, angrily. “Normally, I’d go home. I’d pour a glass of wine and shake off today. What do I do now?” 

“I don’t know,” he said, walking across the room. He started tidying, picking up the mugs and emptying the bins. “When I died, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I thought it was all still the same but everything needed to change. I had to change how I thought, how I saw the world, how I reacted to everything…” He gave a one shouldered shrug as he put the mugs into the sink and tied the bin liner shut. “It took a long time to adapt. I know it’s nothing like what you’re going through but you’ll find a way, Tosh. If anyone can, it’s you.” 

He went to put the Hub into night mode and suddenly the lights in the room dimmed. “Go on. Go home and get some sleep. Night mode’s enabled.” 

“Thanks, Tosh,” he said, walking towards the bunker. 

“Oh for Heaven’s sake, Ianto! You live in that hole in the floor with Jack?!” she asked with loud disbelief. 

“It’s cozy,” Ianto said, smiling.  

“Why didn’t the two of you move into your flat?!” 

“Just sort of worked out this way,” he replied. He took off his suit jacked and draped it over his arm. “After what happened… I started spending every night here. Jack’s bunker sort of became our bunker.”

“Worth coming back from the dead to hear Jack Harkness has gone domestic,” Tosh said, wryly. “Did you have to twist his arm?” 

Ianto snorted a little with amusement. “Nope. It just sort of happened. It was mostly him, truth be told.” 

“Oh?” 

He hooked his finger into his tie and began loosening it. He cleared his throat. “One night I rolled and bruise my elbow something wicked on the wall. The next day there was a double bed. Then it was a hamper. Then the dresser. Then a bigger wardrobe… Before I knew it, most of my things had migrated from my flat to the bunker. The Hub’s my home now.” His smile widened. “Couldn’t imagine living anywhere else, come to think.” 

“Do you still let Myfanwy out on Thursdays?” she asked.

Ianto groaned. It was Friday. He’d neglected the chore. He turned towards the walkway and said, “I didn’t get a chance yesterday.” 

“I’ve taken care of it. Go on, get some rest.” 

“Thanks, Tosh,” he said, brightly. “It’s great to have you back.” 

“It’s good to be here,” she said, flatly. She wished she could smile at him or wave or something but it was a disadvantage of not having a body. 

Once the Hub was silent and everyone was gone, Tosh found herself feeling quite alone. She had no idea what to do, at all, and became bored almost immediately. To occupy her time she decided to read some of the old field reports but Jack was right. She needed to take a step back and reading about work wasn’t taking a step back. That was when she noticed she had no Internet access. The Hub was completely cut off from the outside world. She couldn’t even connect to the team’s PDA’s or mobile telephones. She couldn’t surf the Web or download a novel.

There were explosives beneath the hard drive array that held her consciousness. The Hub was completely cut off from the outside world. Surely they’d know by now if there was a problem with the transfer. Why didn’t Jack trust her? Maybe they were focused on getting Fish out of this mess and maybe they just hadn’t gotten round to deactivating the explosives yet? 

 _This isn’t a Terminator movie. I’m not bloody skynet…_ she pouted. With no other way to pass the time, she returned to the old field reports and performance reviews. It wasn’t boring reading. It was nice to know what the team had been up to. She more wished she had someone to talk to. No, that wasn’t true. She wished she could have a bite to eat, a glass of wine and get some sleep even though she wasn’t thirsty, hungry or tired. _A bath_ … she thought with longing. The idea of slipping into a nice hot bath after such an emotionally exhausting day was an idea that taunted her, snickering at her nastily from the back of her mind.

She thrust aside the disappointment and kept reading the reports. She’d have to bother Ianto to start digitising some of the older files. Or at the least, upload an e-book or two. She wasn’t sure how many old reports she’d gone through before the invisible lift began to descend. Seeing in this new form… body…. whatever it was… was confusing to say the least. She could access a number of cameras simultaneously. She could see and hear all over the Hub. She saw Henry on the lift from a variety of angles, following him as he descended. When the paving stone reached the bottom, she expected a greeting of some sort but none came. 

Henry walked into the kitchen for a glass of water and then back towards his slow moving fiancé. He set the water glass down and sat in the desk chair. Tosh saw how he struggled, forcing himself not to touch Fish in any way. He picked up a small book from the edge of the worktable. He didn’t open it. He reached up, pinching the bridge of his nose between his fingers. 

His voice started out soft but grew stronger as he spoke. “I put the final touches on the seating chart. I know you didn’t want to be bothered with it. I delivered all the place cards to St. David’s. They offered us a suite for the night again but I told them you had wanted to return home afterwards. The florist rang to let me know she has found a quantity of calla lilies in that deep purple you liked. She said it would be extra but I know how much you liked them…” Henry continued to drone on about wedding plans for a few minutes. Tosh felt terribly for him as he spoke to someone who couldn’t hear him. “Anna rang yesterday. She wanted to fly up early but I dissuaded her. I told her how adamant you were that Peter not miss any more school since he is struggling so…” He trailed off, his voice faltering. He choked out a few sobs.  

“I wish you could hear me. I miss you… so much. Your warmth. Your humour.” Henry wiped at his eyes, sighing deeply. “I want you to know that I will never leave your side. No matter how long this takes. I love you, Joe. I will always love you.” 

He rolled his chair closer to Fish, searching the fearful and confused face. He nearly reached out for Fish’s arm but stopped himself. 

Obviously, Henry thought he was alone. If Tosh had a body, right now she’d be squirming. She shouldn’t be eavesdropping on such a private conversation, even if it was one-sided. She was about to turn off the cameras to give Henry privacy but he stopped talking and opened his book. Tosh had been so deprived of entertainment, she immediately honed in on it.

She thought he was going to sit and read in silence. So, she was surprised when he said, “Where were we, love?” 

Tosh didn’t manage to zoom in on the title before Henry began reading aloud. She had no idea what the book was and she didn’t care. It was better than reading old reports. Henry’s voice was low and soothing. It was like listening to an audiobook. 

Henry continued for a while. At first, she didn’t care that Henry was starting in the middle but after a while, the fact that she was completely lost began to wear on her. The book was complicated and Tosh was having trouble following all the characters and plot. Without thinking, she asked aloud, “What are you reading?” 

Startled, Henry dropped the book and leapt up for his weapon. He looked around and then relaxed. He was a little embarrassed. He cleared his throat into his fist and then clasped his hands behind his back. “Ms. Sato… my apologies. I had forgotten that I was not alone.” 

“No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop and it’s Tosh. People say Ms. Sato and I turn around and look for my mum…” she apologised. “You were reading and I was, well… bored. There are only so many old field reports you can read before you want to hear about something else. You didn’t answer my question. What are you reading?” 

“Joe enjoys the fantasy series, _A Song of Ice and Fire_ ,” Henry said, closing the book. He held it up to the camera. “It is a series of five, quite lengthly novels. The author is writing more. This is the fifth novel, _A Dance with Dragons._ ”

“No wonder I feel like I’m missing something,” she said, with a small laugh. “I’ve heard of it. People raved about it but I never liked fantasy so I never bothered. It sounds good though.”

“Fantasy is not my favourite genre of literature either but it is quite a thrilling tale. If you’d like, I can start at the beginning for you.” Henry walked over to Fish’s desk and dug through one of the drawers. He picked up a very worn copy of the first book. He frowned at it. “I believe the pterodactyl has been gnawing at this…” 

Tosh laughed. “She likes paper. Always has. You don’t have to start over for me.” 

“I am not foolish. I know that Joe can neither hear nor see me and that reading to him is more for my benefit than for his,” Henry said. He turned the book in his hands, examining the damage. “I would be happy to help alleviate your boredom, as I feel somewhat responsible.” 

“It’s not your fault,” Tosh insisted. She turned on the computer monitor next to Henry and displayed herself on the screen. “No one even introduced us properly. I guess that’s what happens when you’re disembodied.” 

Henry turned and smiled. He bowed slightly and said, “I’m Henry Fitzroy and, as he cannot speak for himself, this is my intended, Doctor Joseph Fischer. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Toshiko. Though Joe has never met you, he speaks of you often with great admiration for your skill and intellect. I would like to apologise for this… unusual situation in which you find yourself.” 

“It’s lovely to meet you both,” she said, smiling. She took her glasses off. She wondered if she could modify the program so she didn’t always appear with them on. “And stop. You don’t need to apologise. I’m sure Jack wouldn’t have done this if there was another way.” She turned the camera towards Fish. “So, how’d you two meet?” 

He smiled broadly. He muttered to himself, “It was one of the best days of my life.” He cleared his throat and said, “I had just arrived in Cardiff from Canada. I’m afraid I have been unable to shed my sixteenth century mentality towards flight. I despise air travel…” Henry trailed off, suddenly realising Tosh may not be in possession of certain facts. He began nervously fiddling with the worn pages of the book.  

Recognising the fiddling’s origin, Tosh said with a friendly smile, “Ianto filled me in, Henry. Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me.”

Henry smiled and continued with his story. “As I was saying, I find air travel most unnatural. I stopped at the hotel bar for a drink to calm my nerves. Joe was sitting at the bar. I sat down next to him.”

Tosh rested her chin on her hand and smiled. “Quite the chance meeting.” 

“Indeed it was. I had originally planned to go up to my room. I missed the elevator and became impatient,” he remembered, fondly. “We began seeing each other. I moved to Cardiff some months later.” 

“And now you’re getting married,” she said, the smile widening. “It’s so romantic. So let’s hear the proposal story. Who proposed you or him?”

Henry coloured a bit. “I did.”

“Was he surprised?” 

He smiled at the memory. He’d taken so long in deciding how to propose to Fish that his lover was very surprised when the time finally came. “Joe is quite fond of the New Year. The others were kind enough to take the shift so that I could deliver my proposal. I asked him to dance with me during the countdown. I think he thought I merely wished a romantic kiss at midnight, but instead, I dropped to one knee to ask for his hand.” 

“I’ll try to get him to the altar on time for you.” 

“Our upcoming nuptials are not my most pressing concern. Joe’s safety is,” he said, leaning back in his seat. “As I have said, I believe there is some greater danger here of which I am being kept ignorant.” 

 _The immune suppression_ … Tosh realised. Well, she certainly wasn’t going to tell Henry about it. The poor man looked distraught enough. 

“Since I’m up, I could try and find a way for you to talk to him,” Tosh offered. “I could work out something with ultra low frequency or-”

“I appreciate the thought, Toshiko, but you should rest,” Henry interrupted.  

“I don’t know how. I haven’t figured out if I _can_ sleep. I’m afraid that if I try and I start dreaming, I might accidentally do something to the Hub’s systems.” Tosh put her glasses back on and stretched forward. She sat back up and shrugged. “I’m not tired anyway. I’m not tired anyway.” 

“Well, let us get your mind off of your work then,” Henry said. He opened the tattered book and started to read.


	11. Chapter 11

The night with Henry had been great fun. At first, Tosh had listened while he’d quietly read to her but then, curious, she’d began asking him questions about himself and Henry had regaled her with stories of his past. She’d reciprocated, telling Henry all about herself and the hours had flown by. It had been a welcome distraction for both of them. She might be locked inside a computer mainframe but she felt as if she’d made a new friend. As the dawn had approached, Henry had dozed a bit in his seat. Tosh had done her best to leave him undisturbed but he’d woken when the others had arrived. 

That morning, Tosh had dug in with Mickey. She was more determined than ever to get Fish back to normal, back to his fiancé and to his wedding on time. They worked, tirelessly, on the device. Tosh tried her best to keep herself calm and patient. It wasn’t easy. By the time Ianto had ordered dinner, they’d made significant progress and needed to brief the rest of the team. Speaking quietly, in hushed voices over the comms, Mickey and Jack agreed that this discussion was best done without Henry. Unfortunately, Henry was becoming more and more reluctant to leave Fish’s side. While Jack regularly forced the Englishman to get out of the Hub to stretch his legs or get some fresh air, those excursions were never long. So, Jack had suggested a course of action. Mickey went to talk to Ianto while Tosh talked to Martha.

Tosh tried to access the comm system to speak to Martha privately but found that she wasn’t able to. Some of the internal communication system was off limits to her. She’d stumbled across a great many restrictions to her access and while they didn’t surprise her, they still disappointed her. She was beginning to feel like a prisoner and she’d been a prisoner once before. She made a point to speak to Jack with it as soon as possible. 

She focused the Hub cameras, turning and moving them to make sure that Henry was well out of earshot of the autopsy bay. Then, she simply activated the user interface on Martha’s computer, causing herself to appear on the screen. 

Martha was typing up a field report, yawning. She reached over for her coffee just as Tosh’s face appeared on her computer monitor. Startled, she jumped and spilled some of the hot liquid over her hand. 

“For God’s…. Tosh!” she gasped. “Don’t. Do. That.” 

“Shh!” she said, holding up her hand. She took her glasses off and put them down. “I wanted to talk to you where Henry couldn’t overhear.” 

Martha lowered her voice and said, “You could’ve just contacted me over the comm, not scared the daylights out of me.” She got up and rinsed her hand in the sink.

“I would’ve done but I don’t have access. I don’t have access,” Tosh said, acerbically. She sighed. “I wanted to talk to you about Fish.” 

She sat back down and said, “What’s wrong?” 

“Mickey and I want to update everyone on our progress but I know we’re not telling Henry everything. So, Jack suggested you slip him something.”

“Slip him something?” Martha said with disbelief. “Jack asks him to go for a walk every once in a while. Why can’t he do that this time?”

 “He’s never gone more than ten minutes. I know it’s a bit sneaky, but it’s probably a good idea. He’s barely slept since all this started. A little sedative won’t hurt him and he needs the rest,” Tosh insisted.

“Henry’s not stupid. I think he’ll notice if I come at him with a syringe. How am I supposed to-”

“Refill, Martha?” Ianto asked, walking into the autopsy bay with his tray. He had two mugs on it. One with coffee for Martha and another with Henry’s tea. He picked up Henry’s mug and set it down on the desk with an overly innocent grin. 

“Oh, all right,” she said, relenting. She got up and dug through the pharmacy cabinet for a few minutes, deciding on which drug and how much. She carefully emptied a packet of medication into the tea. Ianto stirred it and the powder dissolved. 

“I’d add some extra sugar to cover that,” she warned. 

“Already done. I was a little heavy handed with the milk as well,” Ianto said with a self satisfied smile. “How long until it takes effect?” 

“Has he eaten anything today?” she asked. 

Ianto shook his head with disappointment. Every one of them had been trying to coax the Duke to eat but he’d refused. He’d picked at the meals Ianto put out for him and sometimes nibbled a small snack but he hadn’t actually eaten anything substantial or what could be called a meal. If Miranda were here, she’d scold her former student for neglecting his wellbeing but Ianto knew that Henry probably felt relatively safe within the Hub. 

“Normally, ten to fifteen minutes but it’ll probably be less on an empty stomach,” Martha said. 

Ianto gave her a stiff nod and went to deliver the drug laced tea. He smiled at his friend and put the mug down in front of him. Wanting to get the caffeine into his system as quickly as possible, Henry drank it all down in a few gulps. Martha had been right, it took less time than she’d predicted. It was only a few minutes before Henry’s head began to droop. He told Mickey he was going to rest his eyes for a few moments, closed them and immediately fell asleep. Mickey had barely grabbed him in time before he fell off the chair. Mickey and Ianto carried him to the sofa. After covering him with a blanket, they joined the others in the boardroom. 

As Ianto looked around the table, he couldn’t help but notice that it looked sparse. Gwen’s seat was empty and so was Fish’s. Mickey and Martha were sitting in Hart and Miranda’s seats, respectively. Had he just thought of that chair as belonging to Captain John Hart? He wasn’t quite sure how he felt about that. The former Time Agent’s time with the team had been short but profound. The scoundrel had proven himself to all of them, surprising them all… until he’d slithered back to whence he came. Before Ianto’s resentment had a chance to properly rise up, Jack signaled he was about to start the meeting by rested his knee against Ianto’s leg.

He turned to the others and said, “What have you and Mickey got, Tosh?” 

Tosh appeared on the screen above the table. She took her glasses off and dropped them. She let out an extremely annoyed growl and then said, “Excuse me a minute.” 

She faded from the screen and immediately began editing the user interface program. She changed some lines of code and then added as well as removed others. Satisfied with her work, she reappeared on the television screen, this time without her glasses. Instead, they were on the desk in front of her. 

“That’s better. That’s better,” she said, relieved. She rhetorically commented, “Bloody glasses are pointless. It’s not like I actually need them and I hate they way they look.” She rolled her eyes and made an annoyed noise with her tongue that Jack frowned at. She cleared her throat and turned back to business. “Thank you everyone for coming. Mickey and I have made a lot of progress on the device and we wanted to update you all on where we stood.” 

Mickey tapped the tablet in front of him. A diagram of the device appeared on the screen next to Tosh’s. “Once I got this side panel off, it was easy from there. My original assessment was spot on. It’s not affecting Fish continuously. It zapped him once, did whatever it did and that was the end of it.” 

Tosh furrowed her brow in concentration and the CCTV footage appeared on the next screen. “This is the footage from just before he was affected by the time dilation.”

Martha said, waving at the screen, “We’ve been over that footage a hundred times.”

“Well, you didn’t have me then,” Tosh said, playfully. “He didn’t do anything to activate it when he was handling it.” She played the footage. Fish let out a frustrated huff and then bent down for his tools. She paused the video. “The device was motion activated.” 

Jack let out an amused snort. “So when he crawled under the table…” 

“It got him,” Mickey said. 

“The good news is that when we figure out how to undo this, all we’ll need to do is place the device over him again,” Tosh said. 

“The bad news?” Jack asked. 

“We’re going to have to use a series of trial and error experiments to figure out how to get him back to a one to one ratio and that’s going to take time,” Mickey replied. He pointed at the diagram. “We’re not sure how much, though.”

Jack scrubbed at his face. “How’s he doing, Martha?” 

“Physically, I wish I could tell you because I don’t know,” she answered, honestly. “Mentally, he’s definitely realised something’s up and is showing signs of distress.” 

Tosh interjected, “He hasn’t noticed the note taped to the table yet. Last night, I started working on a way for us to talk to him but I haven’t gotten anywhere with it yet.”

“What have you tried so far, Tosh?” Jack asked. 

“I started with some ultra low frequency pulses through the speakers.”

“No luck?” 

“None,” she said, disappointed. “I don’t think we have a speaker capable of emitting a low enough frequency.” 

“Sending a message will take a long time,” Mickey interjected. “It could potentially take him days to comprehend it and respond.” 

Jack furrowed his brow. “Keep it an after hours project, Tosh.” 

“Yes, Captain,” she said. 

“Good work everyone. With any luck, we won’t have to come up with a cover story for his sister,” Jack said, smiling. He got up, indicating the meeting was over and went back to his office, leaving the rest of them to return to work. He smiled when he saw Henry was still fast asleep. _If only getting him to eat was as easy as slipping him something._

He closed the door behind him and sat down heavily at his desk, scrubbing at his face hard. 

“Keep doing that and you’ll scrub it clean off,” Tosh’s voice said into the room. 

Jack snapped his head up, startled. “That’s kinda rude you know.”

“I need to find amusement somewhere,” she said, dryly. “When are we going to talk, Jack?” 

“What about, Tosh? You should be working on the current problem,” he said, leaning back in his chair. He spoke out into the room, looking no where in particular. 

“I can multitask and you know perfectly well what I want to talk about.” 

“What we’re going to do with you after this is over? Or the explosives underneath the hard drive array?” Jack said, matter-of-factly. 

“How about both?” she replied. 

“How’s about we take this one step at a time and deal with the time dilation?” He stood up and leaned over his desk, putting his hands on the top. He acted as if she was sitting across from him. It made it easier. “You control every camera in the Hub. I’m not surprised you know about them. They’re a precaution. We don’t know what this has done to you yet.” 

“I’m fine. I’m fine,” she insisted, offended. 

“This kind of transfer is tricky even when you’ve got all the right pieces but what we did is like plugging a smart phone into stone hammer.” He sighed, hanging his head a bit. “The explosives stay.” 

“Can I at least get some Internet access?” she asked.

“Denied.” 

She let out a frustrated huff. “Can I have Ianto upload some films or at least a few e-books? I’m bored to tears at night.” 

“I’ll talk to him about it, but from now on, I want your undivided attention on getting Fish out of this mess.” 

“Understood,” she said. 

“Good. Get back to work, Tosh.” 

“Yes, Captain,” she said. If she’d had a body and been walking out of Jack’s office, she would’ve slammed the door. She felt fine. FINE. Yes, she understood taking precautions but hadn’t she proved herself already? Considering everything she’d been through, she felt she was coping quite well. Any normal person should be having a mental break down! She was dead! She’d been uploaded into a computer! What was she going to have to do? How was she going to prove to Jack that she was fine? 

The only thing she could think of was to do her job… _Old job?_ … efficiently and capably as possible. She’d work with Mickey to get Fish out of this situation. It probably wouldn’t completely convince Jack she was fine, but it was a step in the right direction.


	12. Chapter 12

Henry had been up early this morning after an extremely long and deep sleep. After sitting with Fish for a few hours, a rift alert had occurred and he’d volunteered to see to it. He was just returning from that alert. Despite thoroughly searching the area, he’d found nothing had come through. Most of the time, helping the Torchwood team was a diversion from his routine. At the moment, it was more of a welcome distraction. The more he helped the more time it freed for the others to work towards helping his fiancé. 

As he walked back to the main Hub, he massaged at his neck. He still had a slight crick from having slept on the Hub sofa. He couldn’t believe he’d managed to sleep for so long and he highly suspected that Martha or someone else on the team had drugged him. As his first death had been the result of poison, one would expect Henry to be quite cross at the idea of being unknowingly fed a sedative but he wasn’t. The team only did it out of concern and Henry had to admit the long sleep was refreshing and the sentiment touching. Yes, he planned to marry Fish but Henry was not part of the Torchwood team. He only lent a hand occasionally but they had all welcomed him as one of their own into this small, close knit family. It warmed Henry’s heart but there was also sadness seeping in on the edges. 

He could not believe his former teacher, who truly was a full fledged member of this wonderful family, had abandoned them - vanishing without a trace. He’d seen Miranda take these constitutionals before. After heading into the countryside or the wilderness, she would retreat into isolation for a brief time. In the past, he’d understood it. Usually loss and a world weariness crept into her bones and she needed to shed the melancholy and the apathy in her own way. But, in the past, Miranda’s support base had been nonexistent. That was far from true now. He could not understand why she had retreated when she was surrounded by so much companionship and love. 

Each and every one of the Torchwood team felt her absence probably more so since she’d left no way for them to contact her. In the past, a letter could take weeks or months, sometimes over a year, to reach its destination. But this was not the past. This was the age of texting and mobile telephones and social networking. Henry could tell that her silence hurt them far more than her absence. Like for a lost sister, they reached out with their hearts and Henry did not understand why she was putting them through this. He was profoundly disappointed in her. 

He walked towards Fish’s workstation so that he could compile his incident report. He ran his hand through his hair as he walked past Mickey and Tosh. The two of them were still hard at work on the same experiment they’d been conducting when Henry had left. 

“Ewww,” Mickey said, wincing. “I think this one went faster.”  

“It did. It did,” Tosh groaned from her place on the computer screen. 

“What was that?” Henry asked. While he waited for the workstation to boot, he leaned towards the table. 

“A tomato plant from the hothouse,” Tosh replied. 

The poor plant was nothing more than a dried out stick. All its leaves had withered and dropped, laying around the pot. 

“I take it this was not the desired outcome?” Henry asked, rhetorically. 

“Well, it looks like every bloody plant I’ve ever tried to grow,” Mickey tried to joke. “So, no, not the desired outcome but the expected one.” 

Mickey had been absently tossing his pen up into the air and catching it. This time, Henry’s question had distracted him slightly and he dropped it. It rolled off and fell through the grating. He swore under his breath. “That’s the fifth plant we’ve fried.” 

“Ianto’s going to be so cross… so cross,” Tosh giggled. Her expression turned serious. She put her glasses back on and displayed the readings on the computer screen. “We’re getting reliable data though.” 

“Well, there’s that,” Mickey said, examining the display.

“How is the fate of this plant good?” Henry asked. 

Mickey pointed at the lego piece. “Each cylinder actually turns. We’ve no idea how to turn them from the outside, but now that we’ve got it apart, we’re doing it from the inside. It sets the time dilation. Right now we’re turning each one a set amount and trying it on a plant to see what happens.” 

“And through trial and error you hope to find the correct combination to restore Joe,” Henry said, nodding. 

“Exactly,” Tosh replied. “We’re using live plants right now because, we’ll be able to see a visual change immediately without having to do more tests.” 

“One more and we can move on to phase two. I’ll get another plant,” Mickey said. He looked around for Ianto and then walked towards the hothouse. 

“What’s phase two?” Henry asked, turning to the computer. 

“We adjust the device to try to get the screwdriver Fish dropped back to normal,” Tosh said. She tucked her hair behind her ear. “We’re not sure how long that will take.” 

Henry picked up the plant to dispose of it. He was about to toss the whole thing into the bin when he saw that Mickey had only been disposing of the plants and their dirt. He tipped the pot into the bin, letting the shrunken plant fall. He heaved out a sigh when he saw that it was suspended in mid-air. He tilted his head at the sight for a moment, marveling at it and how strange his life had become. He pushed it down against the others then walked to where Mickey had placed the other pots. Out of curiosity, Henry held the pot out in front of him and let go. It remained suspended in mid-air. He smiled at the sight, pushing at it with his finger, turning and twisting it. Again, he let out a wry chuckle at the strangeness of his circumstances and then put the pot down onto the floor with the others. He brushed his hands together to rid them of any dirt. “Am I correct that you have not received permission to desiccate Ianto’s plants?” 

Tosh shrugged. “We didn’t want to use any of the alien ones. We didn’t know what accelerating their growth would do.” 

Mickey set another plant down on the work table. “Good thing this is the last test cos this is the last plant.” 

“How is it the last plant? We should have one more,” Tosh said, confused. 

“Seven plants total. The one that we wrecked and then the remaining six. This is the last one.” 

Tosh shrugged. “Must’ve lost track…” 

Henry watched as Mickey reached into the partially disassembled device to turn the last cylinder. He used the fiber optic camera to guide his movements. 

“That should do it,” Mickey said. He put the pot onto the floor and then dumped an entire glass of water over it, soaking the soil. He used a broom to push it under the table, directly beneath the device. 

It was like watching a time lapse video. Henry’s jaw dropped slightly as the small plant grew. It shot upwards but didn’t get very far. Even though Mickey had over watered it, the plant was growing too fast. Having used all the water in the soil, the plant’s leaves began to wilt. The edges quickly turned brown and that brown spread. The leaves then began to drop, one by one, until the plant was nothing more than a dried out stick. 

“If this is always the expected outcome, why bother watering it?” Henry asked, curious. 

“The first plant we used ended up dying so fast we couldn’t collect any data,” Tosh answered. 

“Water’s the limiting factor,” Mickey said, kneeling down. He used the broom to pull the pot back towards him. The dirt was shrunken and pulled away from the pot. 

“You want me to crunch the numbers, Mickey? Mickey?” Tosh asked. 

“Yeah, if you don’t mind, Tosh. You’ll do it faster than I can,” he said. He walked over to the large rubbish bin, tipping the pot upside down. The shrunken dirt fell easily from the pot. Just as when Henry had disposed of the other plant, it remained suspended in the bin. Mickey pushed it down further and then put the pot down on the floor with the others. He’d bring them all back up to the hothouse while he waited for Tosh to do the calculations. 

“Be back in a bit,” she said, brightly, and then vanished from the screen. 

The corner of Henry’s mouth quirked into a slight smile. “She is happy to be useful.” 

“Woman was a ruddy genius,” Mickey said, picking up a few of the pots. “Do you mind giving a hand, Henry? I need to get these back up to the hothouse. Killing all of Ianto’s plants will make him a bit cross, not picking up after ourselves might make him go nuclear.” 

Henry smiled and reached down for the other pots. He followed Mickey up into the hothouse. Mickey opened the door, immediately slapping the plant tendril that reached for him. Henry side stepped the same tendril, eyeing it with suspicion. 

“It’s not dangerous,” Mickey said. He bent down and pushed the pots under the table. “Just wants attention is all. Fish usually takes care of it. I think it fancies him. Probably misses him.”

Henry handed the pot to Mickey so he could put them away and then turned his attention to the plant. The tendril snaked towards him, and curious, Henry reached up, letting it curl around his wrist and hand. It was quite gentle. He stepped towards the plant and reached his fingers into the pot. The soil was a bit dry. He patted the tendril but it was reluctant to let go of him. He wiggled his fingers to free them and removed the small watering hose from the wall. He sprayed the dry soil as the plant’s tendrils coiled around his hands and arms. It was almost affectionate. He reached out and ran his fingers over the plant and felt it ripple. 

“How’d you sleep last night, mate?” Mickey asked, concerned. 

“Very well, thanks to whatever sedative your wife slipped into my tea,” Henry deadpanned. At Mickey’s sheepish expression, he said, “I’m not cross. I understand it was done for my welfare. I am quite touched that you are all so concerned. I admit that I needed the rest, albeit forced.”

“We were worried about you, mate,” Mickey replied. 

Henry nodded. “I’m afraid my anxiety has caused sleep to elude me. When I do attempt it, I can never manage to fall asleep. Even if I do so out of exhaustion, it is only for a short while.” 

“Martha can give you something regularly,” Mickey offered. 

“I appreciate the offer, Mickey. It is not that I have not considered it, I do not believe it necessary as of yet.” 

“You feeling better now, after a whole night?” 

“Much. Though, I imagine Toshiko missed the company. I spent most of the night before last reading to her.” 

When they’d entered the hothouse, they’d propped the door open but Mickey removed the small brick and shut it. “Sorry, I don’t want her to hear us. There’s no security surveillance in here. If we keep our voices down, she shouldn’t be able to hear us. How do you think she’s handling things? She seem like herself?” 

“I am unable to provide an accurate assessment as I did not know her before but Ianto has said she is herself and I trust his judgement. I certainly haven’t noticed anything irrational about her behaviour,” Henry said, shrugging. “Is there concern that the transfer was unsuccessful or has damaging to her psyche?” 

In a quiet voice, Mickey said, “It was a concern cos I had to MacGyver something together. Jack had me install a failsafe system below the hard drive array. There’s that portable EMP pointed at the drives and a small explosive charge. He hasn’t asked me to dismantle it yet.” 

“I’m certain its usage will only be as a last resort,” Henry said, frowning. “Once Toshiko has proven her stability over time, it will no longer be necessary. She seems remarkably well adjusted given the circumstances.” 

Uncomfortable, Mickey began to test the soil of various plants on his side of the hothouse to see if they needed watering. “Jack tried to explain to me that it’s not really Tosh. It might sound like her. It might act like her, but it’s not really her.” He reached out his hand for the watering hose and Henry passed it to him. He started watering several of the other plants. “It’s just an imprint - an image. It’s like a really accurate, interactive video of her.” 

“I do not believe that’s true. She has consciousness. She’s sentient,” Henry said, leaning against the table. He swatted the plant tendril as it curled by his neck, trying to dip inside his shirt. 

“I’m not saying that’s what I think, Henry. Honestly, I don’t know what to think. It’s a question that’s more for philosophers and theologists that’s too bloody deep for me,” Mickey said, shrugging. “I’m going to see if she’s got those numbers yet.” 

He pushed off from the table and left the hothouse.

Henry tried to digest what he’d just heard as the plant near his neck gave him a nudge. He returned the affectionate pat. “Do you miss Joe?” 

The plant gave a shake, almost as if it understood him. 

“I miss him, too,” Henry said, softly. He turned and left the hothouse. As he walked back down to the main Hub, what Mickey had told him turned in his head. The more he thought about it the more troubled he became. Instead of heading back towards Mickey and Fish, he walked towards Jack’s office. He knocked on the door and politely waited. 

“Come in!” Jack called out. 

Henry opened the door. Jack was alone, sitting at his desk. 

“Ianto’s not going to be happy about his tomato plants,” he said, mostly to himself. 

“If I might have a word about Toshiko?” Henry asked. 

To his surprise, Jack cast a nervous look up at the camera in his office. He stood up and said, “How about we stretch our legs while we talk?” 

He didn’t give Henry a chance to respond. After he grabbed his coat, he strode past the Duke, forcing him to follow. They took the invisible lift up to the Plass and started to walk. 

“Sorry, I don’t want to talk about her inside,” Jack said. He waved at the cameras. “She doesn’t have access to these. What’d you want to talk about?”

“Mickey has said some disturbing-”

“You know about the EMP and the explosives,” Jack said. It was a statement, not a question. 

“I do and I find it most distasteful-” 

“Stop right there, Henry,” Jack said, holding up his hand. “Look, I know if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it should be a duck, but that isn’t Tosh in there.” 

Henry said, disappointed, “I do not wish to enter into an existential debate about whether or not this ‘upload’ is, in fact, Toshiko Sato or merely a precise replica or image. I believe such a discussion is moot. Whether it is the original or not, it has consciousness - sentience. I believe that has merits of its own.”

“There are larger issues here. Artificial intelligence is tricky.” 

“I do not believe there is anything artificial about Toshiko, at the moment, Jack, other than what her consciousness is currently housed in,” Henry protested. 

It was times like these that Jack saw precisely what Fish loved about the sixteenth century man. He was open minded and flexible, much more so than Jack would ever expect from someone of that century. There were plenty of people born in the twentieth century who wouldn’t consider Tosh sentient or conscious. They’d look at her as nothing more than a sophisticated computer program, easily terminated or deleted. This was far more complicated than that. Jack knew that and it seems that Henry did as well. 

“I understand your prudence with regards to installing these explosives but I believe their continued presence is unwarranted. I have spent some time with her, Jack. She is coherent. She’s rational,” Henry insisted. 

“It’s not that simple,” Jack tried to explain. “We need to keep an eye on her and we need a panic button in case she goes off the reservation.” 

Henry stood there, silent for a few moments. A look of deep concentration crossed Henry’s face and Jack realised this must be the pensive look Fish spoke of so often. After a few moments, he tilted his head, looking at Jack and said, “May I at least petition you to increase her allowances? That she be permitted access to the Internet so that she might find entertainment for herself after hours?” 

“Request noted,” Jack said, stiffly. 

“In other words, request… denied,” Henry said, just as stiffly. 

At that moment, Henry’s carriage and demeanour shifted, subtly. The concerned friend slid aside and the regent floated forward. One might think that by the fifty first century there’d be no such thing as nobility but there was. It’s human nature for some individuals or groups of people to think they were better than others for whatever reason. There were plenty of planetary and colony leaders or even just the super wealthy who claimed to be ‘noble’ but Jack knew there was more to nobility than political power or money. And Henry was showing him true nobility. Jack couldn’t help but admire his passionate defence of someone he didn’t even know. Again, he was getting a glimpse of what Fish saw in this man. 

“Jack, while your team sleeps at night, Toshiko is resigned to an eternal wakefulness. While my insomnia has allowed me to fill her nights, as soon as Joe is out of danger, that will cease. It is nothing short of cruel to allow her to endure these nights with nothing but the contents of the Torchwood mainframe and her own isolation. Surely, providing her with some form of entertainment is not out of the question.” 

“I’ll have Ianto upload some e-books and movies for her,” Jack said, tilting his head. 

Henry nodded. “Thank you.” 

“You’re welcome,” Jack replied. 

“May I inquire as to what will become of Toshiko once this crisis has past?” he asked. 

“Undecided,” Jack said, flatly. 

“Joe has often praised Toshiko’s genius, her fluid and intuitive understanding of alien and futuristic technology. There is a great deal Joe could learn from such an individual. The two could make an useful contribution together.” 

“I don’t doubt that. We need to wait and see,” Jack repeated. 

Henry nodded, accepting the choice. “I would like to advocate for her when the time comes.” 

“I’ll take that under advisement.” 

Henry gave Jack another curt nod and headed back towards the invisible lift. He was certain that once Fish was back to normal that he would also wish to advocate for Tosh’s place on the team. 


	13. Chapter 13

Mickey sighed as he watched the invisible lift ascend up to the Plass with Jack and Henry. He wondered what they were up to for a brief moment before turning his mind to the problem at hand. He scrubbed at his face, examining the data in front of him again. Tosh had run the numbers and he’d adjusted the time dilation device and had put the affected screwdriver beneath it. It had sped up, just as they’d predicted but not completely back to normal. Frustrated and confused, Tosh had run the numbers again but their best test subject had just been destroyed. There was another screwdriver but it was still in Fish’s hands and they certainly couldn’t test things out on Fish. 

“I don’t understand it,” Tosh whinged. “I ran the numbers a dozen times!” 

“Don’t get your knickers in a twist,” Mickey said, snapping a bit. 

Tosh glared at him from the computer screen. 

“Sorry,” he replied, sighing. “I don’t get it, is all. This should’ve worked!” 

“Do you want me to go through the calculations again?” she asked, not knowing what else to suggest. 

“Show me the data,” he said, sitting down. Maths had never been his strong point but it wouldn’t help to take a look. “We can work through it together.” 

“I ran it properly!” she said, indignant. 

“I’m not saying you didn’t,” he soothed, “but another pair of eyes wouldn’t be a bad thing, now would it? Calm down, Tosh.” 

She was spending nights talking to Henry. She was probably just as emotionally invested in this as the rest of them but there was an anxiousness on the edge of her voice. He couldn’t understand why Tosh was so worked up. Every scientific process had these sorts of bumps in the road. They were working through it. Sometimes you took two steps back to take three steps forward.

The tables and charts from their experiment came up on the screen. He went through it, carefully. Everything looked correct. 

“Maybe we should expand the sample set…” he suggested. “We only did one test on each cylinder.” 

“You think there’s a statistically significant margin of error on a device that dilates time?” she said, annoyed. “Doubtful. Doubtful.” 

“We could have a statistically significant margin of error in our observations,” he pointed out. 

“The Hub sensors are alien. They’re taken from a deep space probe that crashed in Scotland,” Tosh said, patiently. “They’re more accurate than anything available on Earth right now.” 

Mickey sighed, leaning back, scratching at his head. There was absolutely no way Tosh’s calculations could be wrong… could there? It was possible. She wasn’t a computer, after all, only uploaded into one. “Can you show me the calculations?” 

Tosh shrugged and displayed the relevant information. 

He tapped the screen. “Show me step by step.” 

With a funny scrunched look of intense concentration on her face, the information flashed across Mickey’s screen. Tosh carefully displayed each calculation. A frown appeared on Mickey’s face and it deepened with each subsequent step. He couldn’t see anything wrong. 

“How did you process it?” he asked. 

“I wrote up a quick program,” she replied as if she were stating the obvious. 

Maths weren’t his strong point but computer programming? That he could handle. He asked, “Show me?” 

After another scrunched look, the code appeared on the screen. The program was large, much larger than Mickey thought it needed to be for what it was doing. Then again, he thought writing a whole program was overkill for something so simple but it wasn’t like Tosh could break out a pencil and a piece of paper. He squinted at his screen. 

“Why did you use this language?” he asked. 

“I wanted the challenge,” she said, the image shrugging. 

He pointed at the screen. “You misplaced this brace.” 

“It’s just a brace. Are you one of those programmers that thinks formatting is just as important as the code even though it’s only cosmetic? Obsessive compulsive that is. Obsessive compulsive that is. Obsessive compulsive that is-” 

It was like some sort of repeated stammer. Was she poking fun at him? Mickey rolled his eyes dramatically and said, defensive, “It makes it easier for someone else to read it!” 

She giggled. “It’s okay, Mickey. We’ve all got our issues.” 

“Says the woman uploaded into a bloody computer system,” he muttered. 

“Oi! I heard that!” she snapped. 

He smiled, enjoying the banter as he shook his head. As he examined the code, the smile remained but faded a bit. “This looks fine.” 

“I’m glad you think it looks fine. It spit out some freakish numbers,” Tosh said, offhandedly. 

“What? Wait, I thought you said you used the program?” he asked, confused. 

“I did. Then I saw it wasn’t functioning properly,” she replied with the same nonchalant tone. “Couldn’t figure out why so I ran the numbers myself.” 

Mickey sighed. _Well that was a waste of time…_ The whole point of having her show him the program was to find their mistake. _Wait… errors?_ “There’s nothing wrong with the program, Tosh. What do you mean it was spitting out freakish numbers? I shouldn’t have done.” 

Tosh displayed the numbers and Mickey’s confusion deepened. “This is what I got.” 

“Strange…” he said, furrowing his brow. The numbers were wrong. “What did you get when you ran it yourself?” 

Tosh displayed another set of numbers. Mickey frowned. He opened up the printer and took out some paper. He found a calculator inside of the desk drawer and began to manually crunch the numbers. To his surprise, the second set of numbers Tosh had provided him with was wrong as well. It was always possible that he’d miscalculated. He did it again and got the same results. He ran through the calculations a third time but it was just a display. He was only copying what he’d done before in automatic fashion so that he could think. What if the strange repeat from earlier wasn’t Tosh teasing and was a symptom of a larger problem? Could these calculation issues also be a symptom? The program had been written perfectly. There was no reason it shouldn’t have given them the correct parameters but the ones that Tosh had shown him were wrong. He needed to look into it more carefully later… away from the Hub’s security cameras. 

“You were off a bit,” he said. 

“What?” Tosh said, shocked. 

“It’s just a little. Probably a rounding error,” he said, shrugging. He didn’t want to raise any suspicions. 

Tosh remained silent. Her calculations couldn’t possibly be wrong. She went over everything she did again and again but still got the same numbers. How was it wrong? 

“Don’t worry about it, Tosh,” Mickey said, as he set up the next experiment. “We need to test these new parameters. We can figure it out later.” 

“You could be wrong too, you know,” she snipped. 

“I could. Which is why we’re going to test it before we go zapping Fish.” 

It didn’t take the two of them long to realise that Mickey was, in fact, correct. His numbers and calculations worked out perfectly and the screwdriver was completely back to normal. Elated, Mickey rode the invisible lift up. He saw Jack and Henry were by the water. Henry was already walking in his direction. Mickey smiled broadly. He waved his arms and shouted, “Jack! Henry! We’ve got it!”


	14. Chapter 14

When the two screwdrivers rolled off the table, Fish let out a frustrated huff. He told himself for the thousandth time that he should stop putting it off and properly level the table. You’d think with the amount of frustration it caused him on a daily basis, he’d move it further up on his to-do list. Angry, he took off his gloves and put them down. His knees protesting, he crouched down to pick up his fallen tools. He picked one up and put it back onto the table when he felt a strange sensation. It was almost like a small wobble, like the feeling in your belly when a lift stops or when you drive over a hill to quickly. He dismissed it as a bit of indigestion. When he reached forward for the second screwdriver, the lights in the Hub dimmed for a moment. Fish made a mental note to check the electrical system, his frustration and annoyance deepening. It wasn’t like the lights to dim like that. 

He grabbed the edge of the table and with one hand on his knee, he pushed himself back up. He turned, looking around at the lights. A sudden pain lanced up his calf. He bent down and picked up his the leg of his jeans, noticing a large bruise. 

 _What the…_ He wasn’t the type to bruise easily at all. If he jolted himself hard enough to leave a bruise, he usually clearly remembered it but he had no idea how he’d hurt himself. He’d barely started sifting through his memory for the incident when the Hub lights dimmed again. He shook his head and dismissed the bruise. He’d ice it when he got home. He adjusted his jeans and then craned his neck, looking up at the Hub lights. They seemed steady now but something was definitely wrong. 

He looked around just as the Hub lights flickered again. He shouted, “Ianto? Jack?” 

The Hub was completely silent. He couldn’t hear the water cycling over the water tower or the air circulating fans or Myfanwy rustling in her nest. The lights flickered again. But the electrical problem and the silence weren’t what terrified him the most. 

 _“IANTO?! JACK?!”_  

What terrified him was that his voice hadn’t echoed back at him. 

Fish wasn’t easily frightened. Sure, he had things that creeped him out, disturbed or startled him but very little that frightened or terrified. Those things were confined to the truly unnatural - things that defied physics and everything his senses knew to be true. The cavernous Hub usually echoed every single sound, especially a shouted voice. The stone cold silence as the sound of his voice had fallen flat truly terrified him. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Gooseflesh popped out all over his body. His stomach plummeted and his heart rose into his throat. A cold, fearful sweat began popping out over his body. 

“IANTO?! JACK?!” he shouted again, this time his voice croaked with fear. Still, there was no echo. The fact that the lights went off and on didn’t do anything to help his anxiety. He swallowed the lump in his throat and calmed the terror creeping up from his chest. He took a few deep breaths and felt calm return. 

He raised his hands to his mouth, cupping them, and shouted as loudly as he could, _“ANYBODY!?”_

Again his voice didn’t echo back to him… but the lights dimmed off and back on again. His heart began to pound and a cold sweat broke out over his palms as a far more disturbing thought entered his mind. _Am I dead?_  

He swallowed again, as his mind turned to Henry. _No…_ The lump in his throat was larger now. _Great,_ he thought sarcastically, _I die and the Hub is my afterlife. That’s fucking perfect._

After swallowing one more time, he shook the idea of passing into the next life from his head. His heart was still pounding as he tried to think of all the other possible options. As his mind began to dart from one impossible idea to the next, the entire team appeared in front of him. 

“JESUS MOTHER FUCKING CHRIST!” Fish shouted, flailing backwards. “Where the bloody hell did all you come from?! What the fuck!?” 

Mickey whooped and Ianto clapped. Martha was laughing as Jack clapped Mickey on the shoulder. Henry pushed past Jack and Ianto to hug his fiancé. 

“Henry? What are you doing here?” Fish asked, surprised. To his dismay, Henry was trembling. He held onto him tightly, rocking him slightly and rubbing his back. “I’m fine, Henry. I’m right here.” 

Fish finally managed to extract himself from his fiancé’s arms and turned to his teammates, angry. “Will someone please tell me what the fuck’s happened?” 

Henry turned him around to face the note he’d taped to the table. Fish leaned over, squinting, unable to make out the writing. He reached for his reading glasses and put them on. 

“Time dilation?” he asked. He looked at the rest of them. “How bloody long have I been stuck here?” 

“For us? Or for you?” Mickey asked, a smirk on his face. 

“For you, you git. I know how bloody long it’s been for me,” Fish said, with an acerbic eye roll. 

“Five days, fifteen hours, twenty three minutes and three seconds,” Ianto rattled off, smoothly. 

Fish’s eyes went wide and he leaned on his worktable for support. He pointed at Jack. “You just left for a shag in the archives less than a bloody minute ago!”

“As much as I wish that was true, Fish, that was actually last week,” Jack said, smiling. He shot Ianto a wink. “Well, that time anyway.”

Fish looked around at all of them. It didn’t seem possible. “You’re telling me I’ve been standing here like a bloody statue for nearly a week?” 

“Well, you moved a bit,” Gwen said, grinning. 

“Not much, mind, but slow enough Mickey and Ianto were contemplating tying your laces together,” Martha teased. 

While Mickey and Ianto looked sheepish, Fish reached out for Henry, pulling him close. “You must’ve been going spare!”

Fish pulled back and kissed Henry deeply, not caring about their audience. After brushing his fingers across Henry’s brow, he turned to Mickey and clapped him on the shoulder. “Thanks, mate. I owe you one.” 

“As much as I’d like to take all the credit,” Mickey said, sighing. “I can’t do that.” 

Tosh’s face appeared on the workstation behind him and she waved. “Hi, Fish! It’s nice to finally meet you in person.” 

Fish’s jaw dropped and he sat down in front of the computer. “Mickey! You finished my AI! That’s brilliant! I’d hoped she’d be able to help out with the tech.” 

Tosh got a somewhat offended expression. “Excuse me, but I am not ‘your AI’.” 

He turned and looked at Mickey. “Still a touch cheeky, eh?” 

“Oi! I’ll give you cheeky!” Tosh shouted. “For starters, starters, why did you move my worktable? It was level where it was!” 

Fish looked at the workstation with confusion then turned to Mickey for an explanation. 

“I couldn’t suss this out on my own, mate,” Mickey said, shrugging. “I tried, I really did.” 

“We found an old memory imprinter,” Ianto said, waving at the workstation. “Tosh had imprinted her personality and memories onto it without realising. We uploaded her into the mainframe.” 

“You what?” Fish gasped. He couldn’t believe it. 

“We were running out of time,” Martha said, stepping forward. 

Fish gaped at all of them. “You uploaded someone’s consciousness onto the mainframe to get me to my fucking wedding on time?” 

“Fish, you were in real danger. The time dilation made you immune compromised. You could’ve gotten sick and your body would never have known your immune system was reacting so slowly,” Martha said. She looked at Henry, nervously. They hadn’t told him any of this. “We had to get you out of this fast.” 

He looked at the screen, searching her face. Tosh was using his AI image to communicate. Mistaking her for the AI had been a simple mistake. At first glance, the only difference was the lack of glasses. But on closer examination, Fish saw the intelligent sparkle to the eyes. There was just something more in her expression that Fish couldn’t quite put his finger on. Guilt pressed down on him. He couldn’t believe they’d done this to someone. To be imprisoned within the Torchwood mainframe? Disembodied and immortal? It was like a fate worse than death. 

“I’m sorry. I didn’t realise,” he said with a shy smile. He held onto Henry’s hand. “Thank you from us both.” 

“You’re welcome,” she said, smiling. 

He cleared his throat and introduced himself. “Uhh… I’m Joe Fischer, I’m…” he trailed off not quite knowing what to say. 

“The new technician, I know. I know. They’ve told me quite a lot about you.” She smiled and jerked her head towards Henry, winking. “Especially that one.” 

Fish blushed slightly. “I’ve admired your work for a long time.” 

It was Tosh’s turn to blush. “I’ve read your field reports, your research notes. I’ve gone through your field reports. You’ve got some good ideas.” 

“I’d love to hear your opinion on them,” Fish said, eagerly. 

“I’d love to help. I’d love to help,” she said, smiling wider. 

Fish furrowed his brow slightly at her and then turned to the others. “What day is it?”

“Sunday,” a few of them said. 

“I thought it was Saturday,” Tosh muttered. 

There was still plenty of time before the wedding. Anna and her family weren’t due to arrive until Wednesday. He had time to investigate a growing uneasiness in him. 

“You had to change the mainframe, make upgrades. Can I see what you did, Mickey?” Fish asked. 

Henry caught his arm and said, “Joe, you’ve been through a great deal. We should go home so you can rest.” 

“It might’ve been five days for all of you but it was thirty seconds for me,” Fish said, shrugging. He turned towards the east stairs but Jack stopped him. 

“If I’m not mistaken, Fish, you’re on holiday all this week and next,” he pointed out. 

“My holiday starts Tuesday. It’s Sunday,” he insisted. He didn’t think this could wait until he got back from his honeymoon. He looked at his friends. “Look, let me do this one thing and then I’ll go drown in last minute wedding plans and pack for my honeymoon.” 

Henry began to protest, “Joe…”

He caught Henry’s hand and rubbed his lips with his finger, smothering the protest. An idea suddenly came to him of how to buy a few minutes. “You’re the one who’s been through an ordeal. You’re exhausted. Let Ianto heat you up something to eat? Please? For me? Then we can go home, I promise.” 

He jerked his head towards the kitchen and tossed Henry a pleading look. It was a look he’d discovered that his fiancé could almost never refuse. This was the first time he’d donned it on purpose to his advantage. He saw Henry give in with a tight smile, allowing Ianto to lead him into the Hub kitchen. After a few more relieved hugs and well wishes from the rest of the team, they dispersed. Mickey led Fish down into the redesigned mainframe room. He leaned against the door while Fish looked around. Fish let out a low whistle. 

“Spared no expense, eh?” Fish noted. He looked around. “Ianto must have dug into the emergencies fund.” 

“He did. There were a few alien pieces I could’ve used in the archive but I tried to use as much time current tech as I could. I didn’t want the array to be too dependent on it. I wanted it to be something that would last and we could repair or add to. And it would’ve taken a lot of time to interface.” 

“Time you didn’t have,” Fish pointed out and the Londoner nodded. Fish bent down, looking at the link. When Mickey helped, he tried to pick his brain as much as he could. Fish’s strengths with the technology were largely in reverse engineering. Once he knew what an alien or futuristic item did, he could work backwards and figure out how it did what it did or repair it. Identifying and interfacing alien and futuristic technology with their own required a certain finesse that Fish struggled with. “This is really great, Mickey. This transfer was probably seamless.” 

He stood up and looked around at the gigantic hard drive array. Mickey spoke, answering his unspoken questions.

“I overestimated where I could and tried to play it safe,” he said, shrugging. “We didn’t have a lot of time and couldn’t afford any cock ups along the way.” 

Fish nodded and continued to examine Mickey’s work, a slight frown on his face. It didn’t go unnoticed.

“Something wrong, mate?” Mickey asked, leaning in.

“No,” Fish said, examining the explosives and the EMP. 

“It’s a failsafe,” Mickey said, nervously shifting from one foot to the other. “We’d no idea how a mistake or an error would’ve affected her psyche.” 

Fish nodded without commenting. He knelt down and began looking at the array. 

Mickey had seen Fish’s reaction to Tosh. He knew his friend and colleague suspected the same things. He made an unconscious flick of his eyes to the security camera in the hallway. This wasn’t the place to discuss it. He cleared his throat. “You know, mate, you don’t have to do this now. It’ll all still be here tomorrow. I’m sure Jack wouldn’t mind you popping round for a bit in the morning. Why don’t you go home, put Henry to bed? Let him get some sleep. The only time he got any was when we slipped a sedative in his tea.” 

“I just want to get a rough idea,” Fish said, not looking up. 

Just as Mickey was trying to suss out another way to get Fish to go home, Ianto came round the corner. 

“There you are. Henry’s going spare. He wants to get you home,” Ianto said, sighing. 

“Did he eat something?” Fish asked, turning round. 

“I heated him up a curry. He ate bloody fast.” 

With a sigh, Fish stood up. Mickey touched his arm and said, “Mind if I pop by later to see how you are?” 

Fish was about to object but he caught the almost imperceptible wink to Mickey’s eye. He turned to Ianto and said, “Tell him I’m on my way back up. Thanks Ianto.” 

After a smiling nod, Ianto turned and headed back upstairs. Fish clapped Mickey on the shoulder. “I’ll get out of your way. Thanks, mate. I’ll see you later.”


	15. Chapter 15

When they’d gotten home, Fish had expected Henry to either pounce on him or collapse. It ended up being the latter. Henry had sworn to Fish that he was only going to lie down on their bed for a short while, just to rest his eyes. He’d immediately fallen into a deep, deep sleep. Fish had smiled fondly at his fiancé and laid a blanket over him. He walked over to their dresser and turned on Henry’s sound machine. He’d thought it silly to buy a device that played the rain or ocean waves but Henry liked it so he turned it on. Leaving him to sleep, he began to see to the loft. Since Henry had barely left the Hub, there wasn’t much cleaning to do but with Henry so distracted, it had fallen into a state of disorganisation. It certainly wasn’t up to Henry’s exacting standards of orderliness which often rivaled Ianto’s. Fish set to tidying as quietly as possible. There wasn’t much to do and it occupied him until his stomach rumbled. He glanced at the clock and began to fix himself an early supper. Henry was still asleep but Fish didn’t even give one thought to waking him. He knew this was probably the most sleep Henry had gotten all week. 

To his annoyance, once his dishes were cleared away and the dishwasher was humming, the door buzzer had gone off. Fish had leapt up so the noise wouldn’t disrupt Henry’s sleep. It was Mickey Smith. He let the Londoner into the building and then waited at the door. 

“Mickey, you should’ve rang first. Henry’s still asleep.”

“I’m sorry, mate. I didn’t wake him, did I?” Mickey asked. 

Fish shook his head. “No, he’s still out cold.” 

Their temporary team member certainly looked like he’d arrived for an emergency with his PDA, laptop and mobile in hand. Fish gave him a confused look. “The world ending, mate?” 

“World’s always ending,” Micky said, sighing. He set his things down on the dining room table. He craned his neck, looking down the hallway. “You sure he’s out?” 

“Positive. I even turned on his sound machine. All he can hear are ocean waves. If we keep it down, he should stay asleep,” Fish said. 

“The only time he left the Hub was when Jack ordered him to. He didn’t sleep much. He ate even less,” Mickey said, sadly. He scratched at his head, above his ear. “I don’t want to talk about this with him here. Him and Tosh have gotten close.” 

Fish let out a sad sigh. “You noticed it too?”

Mickey nodded, also with a sad look on his face. He knew that uploading Tosh had been a difficult decision for Jack. It had been hard on Ianto. It had even been hard on Martha and she hadn’t known Tosh as well as Jack and Ianto. They’d done it for Fish, for the timeline and now they’d solved one problem only to have another creep up. But this one was a problem that was of their own making.

“It took me a while to string it all together. I wasn’t paying attention, none of us were. We were focused on getting you sorted. What did you see?” 

“She’s repeating phrases. She didn’t know the day,” Fish said. He shook his head. He felt terribly. He knew it was something he couldn’t ignore. He was unsure if anyone else had noticed it. He’d planned on investigating more tomorrow after he’d gotten Henry some rest. He couldn’t imagine how hard this must have been for Tosh, not to mention the rest of the team. And all for him? The guilt was overpowering and Fish vowed run every test he could to find the problem and correct it. She’d saved him. He had to do something.  

Mickey turned his laptop towards him. “I noticed that too. I went back through all the CCTV footage of Tosh since we uploaded her. The repeating didn’t start immediately. It built up slowly, over time.” 

“You didn’t review this at the Hub, did you?” he asked, concerned. “I don’t want to upset her.”

Mickey gave him a sour look. 

“Right, right, sorry. Of course you didn’t,” Fish said. He pulled the laptop close to him. “What other evidence did you find?” 

“Each cylinder dilated time a fixed amount. Jack thinks it’s likely alien and used whatever their time measurements were… are… whatever. Anyway, we changed the dials and conducted experiments, sussed out each dial’s effect. It was just simple maths to determine which dial to turn which way and how much.” 

“This program should’ve given you that,” Fish said, examining the code in front of him. “She wrote this. I recognise the style.” 

Mickey nodded. “But, she told me it didn’t give her the proper data.” 

“It should’ve functioned perfectly. There’s nothing wrong with it.” 

“And it did,” Mickey said. He reached over and tapped a key. “This was what I got when I ran our data through the program.” He pointed at a different table. “But this is what Tosh gave me.” 

“That could just be a rounding error,” Fish said, squinting at the numbers. 

“I thought so. I ran the numbers myself and that’s the data we used to get you back. You might be off but it’s only by a millionth of a second. Maybe less,” Mickey said. 

“Well let’s not split hairs,” Fish replied with a smile. He stood up and went to the kitchen. “Beer?” 

“I could murder one of Ianto’s coffees,” Mickey said, rubbing at his eyes. He tapped at his laptop again. 

“Wish I could help us there, mate. How about a cup of tea?” 

“Thanks,” Mickey said. He pointed at the screen even though Fish was busying himself with the tea. “These are my numbers. Maths aren’t my strong point but I ran them three times and got the same answers. 

While Fish waited for the kettle, he leaned over Mickey’s shoulder and looked at the figures. “I can’t see where the maths error is.” 

“That’s the most disturbing part, mate,” Mickey said, sadly. “The program worked as it should. The numbers it gave us were perfect. The problem is Tosh couldn’t see it.” 

“What?” 

“When you and I look at these numbers or anything really, we see them and our brains identify they’re numbers and their significance.” Mickey tapped his temple. “I don’t think she’s processing properly. There’s a gap somewhere in between her seeing the numbers and the rest of it. She’s seeing them as numbers but I don’t think she’s seeing a zero as a zero or a one as a one. Or maybe she’s mixing up the place value or numbers next to each other are distorting the others. Whatever it is, I think that’s where our problem is. It’s cognitive.” 

Fish dropped some tea bags into the mugs, preparing a strong brew. He and Mickey were in for a long evening. He walked over to his own bag so he could work. “Well, let’s work on how to fix it.”

They weren’t sure how long they were at it but at some point Henry wandered into the room. His hair was sleep messed and he still looked bleary. “Joe? Mickey? Is something the matter?” 

The two men looked up. “Oh, sorry, mate. Did we wake you?” 

Fish stood up and kissed Henry on the cheek. “Peckish?” 

“Perhaps something small,” Henry said with a smile. Fish went to move into the kitchen but Henry waved him off so he sat back down. He went over to the cupboard and dug out some crisps for himself. “You have not yet answered my question, Joe. Is something the matter?” 

Deciding to abandon his work anyway, Fish shook his head and dug out a large bowl. He also set the kettle to boil again, so they could have more tea. “Mickey and I are just looking into some problems with Toshiko.” 

“There is a problem?” Henry asked, concerned. 

“We’re working on it. She’s having some cognitive deficits.” 

Henry furrowed his brow. He put the bowl of crisps onto the table. “I found nothing amiss in my interactions with her.” 

“It’s subtle. You might not have noticed, but it’s progressing,” Fish said. 

“What manner of deficits?” Henry asked. 

Mickey spoke up from the dining room table. “Some phrase repeating and a few problems with numbers.” 

“Have you determined the source?” Henry asked, sitting down. 

“We’re not sure yet,” Mickey said, rubbing at his eyes. He let them fall to the table with a dull thud. “We’re still examining the evidence.” 

Fish put down a mug of strong tea next to Mickey as he sat down, blowing on his own tea to cool it. He reached for the crisps but thought better of it after Henry glared at him. 

“Would it not be more effective to test Toshiko herself?” Henry asked. 

“We don’t want to alarm her,” Fish said. He’d been examining the CCTV footage, listening to Tosh’s dialog. He put only put one ear bud back into his ear so he could hear Henry and Mickey properly while still working. “She doesn’t seem to realise she’s doing anything wrong.” 

“And if that was me,” Mickey said, “that’d be the most upsetting bit.” 

“We want to find out as much as we can before we upset her,” Fish said, rubbing at his eyes. He let out a deep sigh. 

“Is something else the matter, Joe?” Henry asked. 

The two technicians exchanged nervous looks and Henry looked back and forth between them. 

Fish didn’t look up from his laptop when he said, sadly, “It’s not looking good, Henry.” 

Mickey picked up his mug and drank deeply. “The first thing we looked at was the link. I had to cobble something together so there was a chance the problem was there.” 

“So, I looked at the link. It was the obvious place to start.” Fish turned his laptop towards Henry who leaned in to look at it. The display was meaningless to him. “Mickey did a fantastic job. I couldn’t have done it better myself. The upload was seamless. Everything that was on that device was uploaded properly into the hard drive array. I doubt anything was lost in the transfer.” 

“Now, we’re looking at storage capacity and processing power,” Mickey said. He also turned his laptop to face Henry. This time, the sixteenth century man didn’t even bother trying to decipher what Mickey was trying to show him. 

“A deficiency in either area could cause problems similar to what we’re seeing,” Fish explained. “But, so far, I haven’t found anything wrong there either. If we find where the problem’s coming from, maybe we can find a solution.” 

“Or at least a way to halt or slow the damage so we can buy ourselves some time,” Mickey interjected. 

Henry looked back and forth between them. They looked tired and frustrated. He began to suggest, “Perhaps if you both took a short break…” 

Both of them shook their heads in a wordless answer and Henry stood up. “Well, then, let me attempt to make you both some coffee.”


	16. Chapter 16

“I don’t see why we have to go through this again,” Tosh whinged. 

“Because we have to,” Fish insisted. He ran his hands through his hair, exasperated. He hated lying to her. “Look, Jack’s going to want definitive proof that you’re fine and this is the best way for me to do that.”

“But this is the third time!” 

Fish sighed. It was actually the fourth time. Whether she’d forgotten an entire testing session or was confusing the numbers, Fish didn’t know. He’d thought the outlook was bleak yesterday, it was positively depressing today and it was getting harder and harder to conceal his emotions from his voice. He hoped that the frustration was masking his other emotions. 

“I need consistent results over several tests. So let’s start again.” 

Tosh let out another long sigh. Fish heard the fans in the room change speed and was grateful that she was firewalled from the more critical aspects of the Hub. 

“What is the year?” Fish asked. 

“2015.” 

 _Still correct_ … he noted. 

“The month?” 

“April. April.” 

 _Repeated…_ Fish tried to keep his face impassive. The more he taxed her, the worse it got. “Remember the following name and address for me. I’ll ask you later for it. John Smith, 52 Churchill Way, Cardiff.”

She repeated the phrase, sounding more and more exasperated. 

He asked, “What time is it?” 

“Four in the noon after.” 

Fish struggled to not react. That was the first time she’d used an incorrect phrase. He wondered if she’d transposed the syllables or had confused the word entirely. “Count backwards from twenty to zero for me.” 

Tosh started the sequence and Fish listened carefully. 

“… Five… three… two… one…” she said. 

 _Skipped the zero the last two times and this time she missed the four_ …“Great. The months of the year, in reverse,” he instructed. 

Again, Tosh began reciting them while Fish listened. 

“July… June… May… March… February… January… January…” 

 _She forgot April and repeated January_ … Fish noted that in the number sequence Tosh had missed four and in the monthly sequence she’d missed the fourth month. “Can you tell me the address from before?” 

“John Smith. 25 Churchill Way, Cardiff. Cardiff.” 

 _Transposed the number, repeated the city…_ She’d likely transposed the word from before rather than just using it incorrectly.Each time an incorrect answer was given or a mistake made, Fish became more tense. “Great.” 

“How many more attempts am I going to have to go through this?” she asked. 

He should run through the questions a few more times but he didn’t think he had the wherewithal to do so. “That’s the last time. Three consistent results is enough.” 

“You should be helping Henry with the wedding,” Tosh insisted. “Not coming into work on your day off to fiddle with me.” 

Fish had been scrutinizing everything Tosh said and each time he wondered if it was a symptom. Did she think it was later in the week? Fish’s holiday didn’t start until tomorrow. “You helped me. The least I can do is help you.” 

He and Mickey had worked tirelessly, fueled by Henry’s poorly brewed coffee but excellently cooked snacks. They methodically went through every piece of CCTV footage and the mainframe itself. They were relieved to discover that the upload had been perfect and the imprint itself had been pristine… but frustrated that it was breaking down nonetheless. Sorting out why was what had taken the two men most of the night. The human mind was a vastly complex piece of biology. Nothing manmade on the entire planet could come close. By all appearances, the upgrades should have been plenty… but they weren’t. The obstacle was that twenty first century technology was simply not designed to handle something like this. 

Undaunted, the two technicians had continued their work unwilling to believe that there was nothing they could do. They’d run simulation after simulation. They’d researched the best twenty first century computer technologies, even those in experimental stages. They’d phoned Ianto in the middle of the night, dragging the Welshman out of bed so they could pick his brain about what was stored in the archive that they could use to improve the mainframe. In the end, they’d all come up empty handed. There was no piece of twenty first century technology that could handle the immense load of a human consciousness. And to their utter disappointment, there was nothing substantial enough in the archives that would halt the degeneration entirely. 

As a last ditch effort, they turned to slowing the decay instead of preventing or reversing it. They ran simulations, performed calculations, but in the end, they’d come up wanting. Their observations of the CCTV were clear that Tosh was degenerating at an alarming rate. Had even a single day more passed without sorting Fish’s time dilation, likely Tosh wouldn’t have been able to help them at all and Fish would still be stuck, standing statuesque in the middle of the Hub. 

Ianto had pointed out several pieces of equipment in the archive that could slow the deterioration and possibly buy them some time. Today, Fish was examining the decay with a clinical eye to determine how much time they had before Tosh became completely incoherent or, God forbid, dangerous. They needed to know if they had enough time to get those pieces installed into the mainframe and working properly. But the speed of the deterioration was startling. Yesterday, the oddities could have been ignored but not today. Today, it was clear as day something was very, very wrong. This was the final blow - the terminal diagnosis for Toshiko. 

It would take days for Fish and Mickey, working round the clock, to get even one of those pieces of equipment properly communicating with the mainframe. One piece of equipment was woefully inadequate for the task. To make matters worse, they didn’t have that kind of time. Fish estimated Tosh would likely be incoherent in twenty four or thirty six hours. The only saving grace was that Tosh was blissfully unaware that her mind was deteriorating. She was oblivious to her repeated phrases, confused numbers and misused words. _Some silver lining_ … 

Fish knew what needed to be done but it wasn’t his call. With a deep sigh, he got up and walked towards Jack’s office. 

“Good luck!” Tosh called out after him and Fish winced. 

He found Ianto and Jack huddled together, talking in rapid whispers. They immediately fell silent when he entered the room. Fish couldn’t help but smile. 

“Replanning the stag night?” he asked. Not wanting to risk another Torchwood incident and with apologies to Fish’s brother-in-law who wasn’t due to arrive for another two days, Ianto had rescheduled the stag night. Fish didn’t want to mention but he was glad to have a few days recovery in between it and the wedding. 

Ianto gave him a mischievous grin. “Pick you and Henry up tonight at seven?”

Fish answered with a smile and then turned his gaze to Jack. “Got a minute?” 

Jack nodded and smiled at Ianto who stood up and walked out of the room. As he passed Fish, he gave him a quick hug, looking lighter and happier than Fish had seen in a while. “I’ll see you later.” 

Fish briefly hugged his friend back and then let see to the rest of the arrangements. As his wedding had approached, he’d walked in on quite a few of these conversations. Usually, Jack and Ianto were talking about clubs or strippers or typical stag night activities. Even though they weren’t things he and Henry enjoyed, the stag night wasn’t just about the grooms. It was about their friends as well - a rite of passage. He just hoped they weren’t planning on tying him and Henry to a lamppost… naked.

“What’s on your mind, Fish?” Jack asked, grinning from ear to ear. 

“Jack? Could we have a walk? I want to ask about the wedding… I need some advice,” Fish said, looking embarrassed and sheepish. 

Jack looked surprised but stood up and collected his coat. As he put it on, he said, “We did gay sex 101 already, Fish. You’ve been with Henry for years. I would’ve thought you’d graduated to the advanced class already.” 

With a friendly and eager smile on his face, Jack led Fish up to the invisible lift. Years ago, a mortified Joseph Fischer had leaned into his office and asked for an education in the semantics of gay sex. Jack had been more than happy to pass on what he knew. As the two of them rode the invisible lift up, Jack began tabulating suggestions in his head. Henry wouldn’t know what hit him. He was practically gleeful when they stepped off the paving stone and began to walk towards the water. 

Jack said, brightly, “You looking for something to spice up the wedding night? There are lots of things you can do to make it different than the routine. Toys. A little bondage.” 

Fish could tell his friend was delighted and eager to pass on any piece of sexual advice just as he’d been that very first lesson. He felt badly that that sexual tips and techniques weren’t why he wanted to talk to Jack but it was a good reason to attempt to get him alone to talk to him. For the first time in his life, Fish’s ability to blush at the drop of a hat worked to his advantage. He coughed to hide his embarrassment as he felt heat on his cheeks. 

“Another subject for another time,” Fish said, the blush still on his cheeks. “It was just an excuse to get you up here. I need to talk to you about Tosh.” 

Jack raised an eyebrow in surprise. Fish had completely fooled him. His expression immediately became serious. “What’s on your mind, Fish?” 

“I know Henry talked to you about her already-”

“And you’re here to add your voice to that,” Jack finished. 

“In a way,” Fish said, sighing. He turned and leaned against the railing. He’d been in awe of Tosh ever since he’d started working here. He’d seen her work. He’d built upon it. All he’d wanted to do for years was have one conversation with her. He’d invented the entire artificial intelligence interface to honour her. Everything he’d ever heard from Gwen and Ianto and Jack spoke to a good, kind woman. They’d done this to her and Fish felt terribly… but he also wanted to give her justice and dignity as well. “I know Henry was advocating for her. He talked to me on the way home yesterday. He was upset about the EMP and the explosives. He wanted to formulate a concrete plan for Tosh to prove she’s coherent and mentally stable so she could rejoin the team.” 

“I know this already, Fish,” Jack said. He gave his technician a confused look. 

“I’m here to tell you… I’m here to recommend that you detonate the explosives and the EMP. The sooner, the better.” 

At that, both of Jack’s eyebrows rose nearly to his hairline. “I would’ve thought you’d be the first one advocating for her right along with Henry.”  

“Don’t get me wrong, Jack, I feel like a complete shit for coming to you with this, but it’s what needs to be done.” He took out his PDA and played a few of the CCTV clips for him. “She’s repeating phrases. She’s having cognitive difficulties. She doesn’t even know she’s doing it. The imprint is breaking down. Mickey and I worked all night on this. The computer hardware we have can’t handle the amount of processing power required to maintain a fully functional consciousness.” 

“Mickey upgraded the mainframe,” Jack said, furrowing his brow. “You said the upgrades were adequate.” 

“No, you don’t understand. Even if you used every single computer, hard drive, central processing unit and memory chip in the whole bloody world for her consciousness, it still wouldn’t be enough. I’m guessing whatever they make computers out of in whatever century they invented this technology in is entirely different than what we’re using. Our technology - twenty first century technology - can’t handle it and we’re losing pieces of her.”

“What if we graft on futuristic pieces from the archives?” Jack asked. “I’m guessing that’s why you rang Ianto in the middle of the night.” 

“We don’t have enough pieces to compensate. We’d still need to use mostly time current technology. That’s not enough. I also ran some cognitive tests this morning,” he said. He tapped at his PDA a few times and brought up the last test. “The repetition is consistent and repeatable and, even worse, it’s progressing. We don’t have enough time.” 

“How fast?” Jack asked. 

“I can’t give you a precise rate of decay but it’s fast. In the very first cognitive test I gave her, when I asked her to repeat the months of the year to me in reverse order, she didn’t repeat the month of January. In the third test, she did. I could administer the test to her again tomorrow but I don’t think there’s a point. She’s also displaying more irritability than she did when she was first uploaded. It’s like she’s developing Alzheimer’s. I don’t want to tip her off that we know something is wrong especially since she thinks that she’s fine.” 

Jack lifted his head, looking out over the water. Fish read the expression immediately. 

“You already suspected.” 

Jack nodded. He rubbed his hands together, slowly, looking sad. He buried his face in his hands, slowly rubbing at it. He said, mostly to himself, “Like plugging a smart phone into stone hammer…” 

He offered, “I can-”

 The Torchwood Captain interrupted him, pushing off the railing and said, “I’ll take care of it. Go home, Fish. I’ll see you later.” 

Fish knew that arguing with him was pointless. Jack saw this as his duty and nothing Fish could say would talk him out of it. Miranda had been the only other person who Jack let get their hands dirty with something like this. And Miranda wasn’t here. 

He might not be able to step in for Jack but he could be there for him. Jack was far more free with his feelings than most twenty first century men. At first, it was something that made Fish very uncomfortable but not anymore. In fact, he’d learned a great deal from the openness. It had put him more in touch with his own heart and made him a better man. Fish stepped forward and put his arms around Jack, hugging him tightly. “I’ll see you tonight. Promise?”  

Jack hugged him back, kissing the top of his head. Fish could tell the enthusiasm was a little forced when Jack said, “I’ll be there with bells on.”


	17. Chapter 17

Jack had sent everyone home early to get ready for the double stag do. Ianto had arranged a spectacular affair. They were picking up Fish and Henry in a party van and taking them out for a night of gambling and drinking. To Jack’s disappointment, Ianto had already shot down his idea of strippers. He put the Hub into night mode even though UNIT was supposed to arrive tonight to take over the rift while the Torchwood team celebrated. He’d told Ianto to go on ahead, that he’d catch up. Ianto hadn’t said anything. He’d wanted to stay behind, to be there for Jack and Tosh but he could tell Jack wanted to handle this alone. Ianto had only kissed him, told Jack he loved him and went to see to the rest of the stag night arrangements. 

Once the Hub was empty, Jack had rang UNIT, delaying their arrival by a few hours. Since everyone had gone home, no one knew. That is, no one except… 

“Tosh?” he called up into the empty room. 

“Hi, Jack,” she said, quietly. 

“I owe you an explanation,” he said, leaning back in Fish’s chair. 

“No, you don’t. You don’t,” she said. 

What he was about to say might be empty and pointless, but he still wanted to say it. “Yes, I-” 

“I said no, Jack. I said no, Jack.” 

He winced. He’d suspected something but it had gotten so much worse. He’d reviewed the CCTV footage. They’d all been too distracted to notice and it was easily dismissed as normal speech. It didn’t matter anyway. He’d suspected from the beginning that this would be necessary. 

The monitor behind him turned on and the light made him swivel in the chair. Tosh’s beautiful face filled the screen. She pushed the glasses on the desk in front of her around, almost like a nervous fidget. “I read the addendum to Fish’s personnel file. You don’t need to explain anything to me.”

“That addendum’s locked,” he said, darkly. 

“Even, even though there’s nothing, nothing in it,” she pointed out. 

Jack sighed. 

“Just having one is enough even if it is empty. Empty. He’s important somehow to the future. So’s Gwen isn’t she? We couldn’t believe you read her in. But she’s alive and the rest of us are dead. So to speak. So to speak.” She smiled and tried to make small talk. “Ianto said you two got married.” 

Jack winced. This was going to be harder than he thought. “Yeah, we did.” 

“Never saw you, you as the marrying sort.” 

“Sometimes I am.”

“How is Gwen holding up?” 

“She’s tough. She’ll pull through fine.” 

“Does she know? About me, I mean. I mean,” Tosh asked. 

“No, she needs some space from this place,” replied Jack. He didn’t know how he’d manage it but he was going to keep this from Gwen as long as he could. He cleared his throat. “How are you feeling Tosh?” 

“I feel fine. I feel fine,” she said. There was a bitter, nasty quality to her voice. “I’m bored is all.” 

Jack cleared his throat. He didn’t know why he was talking to her. It was making this harder. He said, slowly, “You know why I stayed tonight, right Tosh?” 

“Because you didn’t want anyone else, anyone else to know you’re going to blow me to hell,” she replied. 

He winced. “This’s been tried before, you know. People thought they could live forever in machines or android bodies.” He stood up. “But being disembodied? It wears on people. You see and hear but you’ve got no sense of smell or touch or taste. Computers don’t work like the brain. Your emotions are different, your responses, the way you think. You don’t get hungry but you miss eating. You’ll crave touch and sex and intimacy but you don’t have a way to get it. You can’t sleep. You can’t rest. You’re just… awake. All the time. It’s subtle but it builds. Eventually, it’ll drive you insane. I know you feel like you right now, Tosh, but that imprinter? Even the best ones didn’t capture it all. It took people some time to get it, but you can’t copy a person’s soul.” 

Tosh quirked her eyebrow at him. She took a deep, slow breath and Jack heard the air fans in the Hub change. “I’m a genius. A genius. You hired me because I could go from point, point A to C without having to go through point, point B. Don’t you think I’ve thought of all that? Do you think I want to go mad, mad locked inside the mainframe forever? You saved me. You saved me. You gave me a reason and now you’ve given it to me again. Leave the explosives and give me the dignity of using them myself, myself since you took away my dignity by doing this to me in the first place. In the first place.” 

He didn’t know why he was arguing with her. He should just do it and be done with it already. This wasn’t really her. “You won’t know when. You probably won’t even realise and then it’ll be too late. It’s not just about Torchwood. The world’s connected now. The Internet. Social media. Globalisation. Do you realise the damage you could do?” 

“You gave me a second, second chance once before. Once before,” she pleaded. 

“This is different,” he insisted. “You don’t even realise you’re doing it do you?” 

“Doing what? Doing what?” 

“That. Repeating yourself,” he said, sighing. 

Tosh was eerily silent. Jack wondered if she had started to realise something was wrong. 

“I can fix it,” she insisted. 

“We don’t have the technology. We don’t have the time,” he said, sadly. 

“So it’s enough of me, me, me to help Fish, but not enough for you to let me alive?” she spat back. “Same deal. Six years. You can trust me. You can trust me.” 

He sighed. Her original deal had been five years. “No, I can’t, because like I said, this isn’t really you this time. You’re breaking down - deteriorating.” 

“Is that what your belly’s telling you? Telling you?” 

Jack closed his eyes and hung his head. “My gut’s telling me I should’ve blown the charges without ever opening my mouth.” 

“That’s regret. And guilt. Six years. Six years,” she repeated. 

“No,” he repeated, louder and more firm. 

“What can I do to change your mind?” she asked. 

“Nothing,” he replied. “Don’t make this harder than it already is for me.” 

“I don’t want to die. I don’t want to die.” 

“I’m sorry, Toshiko. But you died a long time ago,” he said. He opened his wrist strap and tapped it to activate the EMP. 

“NO! WAIT, JA-” she shouted.

He squeezed his eyes shut, bracing himself for the explosion that came next. The floor beneath his feet trembled slightly and he scrubbed at his face with his hand. He clenched his jaw and took the fire extinguisher off the wall as he went down the east stairs. He could smell the ozone and the melted plastic before he reached the computer room. The door was half off its hinges. There were pieces of hard drives everywhere - green bits of circuit board singed at the edges and scratched metal plates. Jack raised the extinguisher, putting out the few flames. He went into the room next to it and picked up the imprinter, ripping the link. 

He turned it in his fingers watching the way the low light played on the glass. He carefully set it down on the concrete floor and brought the end of the heavy extinguisher down on it. It shattered, one of the pieces skidding into the hallway. Jack turned and threw the extinguisher. It hit the brick wall, chipping it. It landed with a satisfying bang. He turned away from the mess, stepping on the burned bits of computer as he left. 

He shouldn’t leave the Hub like this. The computer mainframe was likely severely damaged and non-functional. He should recall the team so that they could get to work on rebuilding and restoring everything from back-ups. They should scour the system, ensuring no trace of Tosh remained. 

Jack did none of those things.

Instead, he took a broom and swept the debris back into the room. He broke the broom handle over his leg and tossed the pieces on top of the charred computer equipment. He shut the door as best he could. Then, he planted his hands on it and rested his forehead between them. He banged his head against the door firmly as tears dripped onto the concrete below. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry.” 

He wiped at his eyes then snapped his hand down, flinging the tears onto the floor. After clearing his throat, he turned away from the mainframe room. Fish and Henry had a date with a lamppost that Jack was going to help them keep.


End file.
